Name: Tomato Salad
Ingredients: 1 clove garlic; 6 firm ripe tomatoes; ½ cup vinegar; 1 tablespoon sugar; 2 tablespoons olive oil; a dash of cayenne pepper; a pinch of coarse sea salt

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 ↓

Tomato Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Crush the garlic clove around the inside of a salad bowl.
Slice the tomatoes and place them in the bowl.

Dress and chill

In a separate bowl, blend the vinegar, sugar, olive oil, cayenne pepper, and salt.
Pour the dressing over the tomatoes and chill on ice.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Tomato + olivetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,539 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Garlic + olivetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,665 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Garlic + tomatotop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,076 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together17,451 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes: Make up the body of the salad and release juices that mix with the dressing.
Vinegar: Provides acidity that sharpens the flavor and balances the sugar.
Olive oil: Adds fat that carries flavor and gives the dressing a smoother mouthfeel.
Sugar: Softens the sharpness of the vinegar and rounds out the acidity.
Garlic: Adds a pungent aroma that infuses the bowl and dressing.

Swap the clove

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

Basilfits better
Corianderfits better
Oreganofits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against garlic, tomato, vinegar, sugar, olive, pepper. 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.