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Celery Sandwiches

A sandwich made with celery, walnuts, and mayonnaise on biscuits or white bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and walnut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 852 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Celery Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare dainty baking powder biscuits or thin slices of white bread.

  2. Finely chop the tender part of the celery and soak it in ice water until needed.

  3. Butter the bread or split and butter the biscuits.

Assemble

  1. Mix the chopped celery with chopped walnuts and enough mayonnaise dressing to hold it together.

  2. Spread the celery mixture on one slice of bread and top with another slice.

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 + walnuttop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together852 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Biscuit + walnuttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together58 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Biscuit + celerytop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together150 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Walnut + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Biscuit + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,009 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Tender celery
Provides crisp texture and fresh, mild flavour to the filling.
Chopped walnuts
Adds crunch and a nutty flavour that contrasts with the soft celery.
Mayonnaise dressing
Binds the chopped celery and walnuts together and adds moisture and richness.
Butter
Coats the bread or biscuits, adding richness and keeping the bread from soaking up the filling.

The step that matters

Mix the chopped celery with chopped walnuts and enough mayonnaise dressing to hold it together.. Too little dressing leaves the filling dry and crumbly, while too much makes it wet and soggy, which soaks into the bread. Add the dressing gradually until the mixture just holds together.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (biscuit, walnut, butter):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against biscuit, walnut, butter. 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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