Name: Chicken Salad
Ingredients: meat from cooked chicken; shredded lettuce; dressing (see Monday's recipe); 2 hard-boiled eggs

Why it works: Meat and chicken are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,449 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

meat from cooked chicken
shredded lettuce
dressing (see Monday's recipe)
2 hard-boiled eggs

Directions

Cut the chicken meat into narrow strips, about 2 inches long.
In a bowl, combine the chicken and an equal quantity of shredded lettuce.
Prepare the dressing according to the recipe provided on Monday.
Pour the dressing over the chicken and lettuce mixture, and mix well and lightly.
Transfer to a salad dish and top with sections of the hard-boiled eggs.
Arrange sliced egg whites around the outer edge.

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.

Meat + chickentop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,449 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,421 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Meat + lettucetop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together579 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together6,432 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Chicken + eggtop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,991 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).