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Bavarian Salad

A salad of lettuce, beet, onions, dressed with egg yolk, mustard, oil, vinegar, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Lettuce and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Bavarian Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the onions exceedingly small.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg yolk with the salt, mustard, and salad oil.

  2. Add the vinegar last and mix well.

Assemble

  1. Place the lettuce in a dish, cover with the sliced beet, and pour the dressing on top.

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. Lettuce + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

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

  2. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Onion + lettucetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 recipes

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

  5. Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolk
Emulsifies the oil and vinegar so the dressing holds together rather than separating.
Salad oil
Provides fat that carries flavour and gives the dressing a smooth, rich body.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances the richness of the oil and yolk.
Lettuce
Forms the crisp base that the warm-tasting dressing is poured over.
Beet
Adds sweetness and colour, contrasting with the sharp dressing.

The step that matters

Add the vinegar last and mix well. The yolk and oil must form a stable emulsion before the acid goes in. Adding vinegar too early or mixing too little can break the dressing so it looks thin and separated.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lettuce, vinegar, egg, mustard):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Cucumberfits better
  3. Beetrootfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lettuce, vinegar, egg, mustard. 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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