Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Potato Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the potatoes
Wash and scrub the potatoes with a vegetable brush.
Cook the potatoes in boiling salted water until tender.
Drain, peel, and cut the potatoes into thin slices.
Dress and serve
Grate a little onion juice over the potatoes.
Add cooked salad dressing and toss lightly until mixed.
Pour a little dressing over the top.
For a variation, fry and crumble bacon, mix with potatoes, and pour vinegar over the salad.
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.
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Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,023 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,226 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Potato + vinegartop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,608 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Potatoes
- Form the body of the salad and absorb the dressing as the main starch.
- Cooked salad dressing
- Adds moisture and richness, coating the potato slices and carrying the flavor.
- Onion juice
- Adds a sharp, aromatic note that brightens the mild potatoes.
- Bacon
- Adds smoky, salty fat and crisp texture in the variation.
- Vinegar
- Adds acidity that cuts the richness of the dressing and bacon fat.
The step that matters
Cut the potatoes while they are still warm. Warm potatoes are firm yet tender, so thin slices hold their shape and absorb dressing evenly. Cold potatoes crumble more easily when sliced, and their starch has set, so they take up less dressing.
Swap the potato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, vinegar):
- Mustardfits better
- Cucumberfits better
- Radishfits better
- Potatothe original
Fit is the average pairing score against onion, 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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