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Bean Salad

A simple salad of kidney beans, cucumber pickles, celery, onion, salt, cayenne pepper, and dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Bean Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Drain and rinse the kidney beans.

  2. In a bowl, combine the kidney beans, cucumber pickles, celery, and grated onion.

Season and serve

  1. Season with salt and cayenne pepper to taste.

  2. Mix with your choice of salad dressing before serving.

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

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

  2. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cucumber + celerytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,745 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  4. Cucumber + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,050 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Kidney beans
Hold their shape and provide a firm, starchy body to the salad.
Sweet cucumber pickles
Add sweetness and sharp acidity that brighten the beans.
Celery
Adds crisp texture that stays firm against the soft beans.
Grated onion
Adds sharp aroma and a savory bite.
Salad dressing
Adds moisture and fat that coat the beans and vegetables.

Swap the kidney beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, celery, onion, pepper):

  1. Black-eyed peafits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Chickpeafits better
  4. Kidney beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, celery, onion, 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.

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