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Salad

Celery Salad

A salad of blanched celery dressed with sugar, pepper, sea salt, mustard, oil, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Celery Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Scrape and cut the blanched celery into 1-inch lengths.

  2. Place the celery in a glass dish.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, mix the sugar, pepper, coarse sea salt, and mustard.

  2. Gradually add the oil and vinegar to the mixture, stirring well.

Serve

  1. Pour the dressing over the celery 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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Celery
Forms the crisp, crunchy body of the salad.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the sugar.
Oil
Adds fat and richness, and carries flavor across the celery.
Mustard
Adds sharp flavor and helps the oil and vinegar stay blended.
Sugar
Softens the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard.

The step that matters

Gradually add the oil and vinegar. Adding the oil and vinegar slowly while stirring lets the mustard help emulsify them, so the dressing stays blended rather than separating.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Dillfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, pepper, mustard, vinegar. 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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