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Salad

Shad-roe Salad

A salad of shad roe, tomatoes, lettuce, olive oil, vinegar or lemon juice, seasoned with salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and olive are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,539 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Shad-roe Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the roe

  1. Wash the shad-roe in cold water.

  2. Place it in salted boiling water and boil for 15 minutes until the grains are hardened.

  3. Drain the shad-roe and pour a little vinegar over it, rubbing until the grains are separated.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Peel and slice the tomatoes.

  2. Wash and drain the lettuce thoroughly.

Assemble and serve

  1. In a salad bowl, layer the lettuce, tomatoes, and shad-roe.

  2. Pour the olive oil and vinegar or lemon juice over the salad and serve.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Tomato + olivetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,539 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Lettuce + olivetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Tomato + lettucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,655 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Vinegar + olivetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,297 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  5. Vinegar + lettucetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,370 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Shad-roe
Provides the main protein; boiling firms its grains so they hold their shape in the salad.
Olive oil
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavour through the dressed salad.
Vinegar or lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the fat.
Tomatoes
Contribute moisture and fresh sweetness-acidity to the salad.
Lettuce
Forms the crisp base layer that gives the salad its texture.

The step that matters

Boiling the shad-roe. Boiling for the full 15 minutes sets the egg proteins so the grains firm up and separate cleanly. Undercooked roe stays soft and breaks apart, while overcooking makes it rubbery.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (roe, vinegar, tomato, olive):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Cucumberfits better
  3. Potatofits about as well
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against roe, vinegar, tomato, olive. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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