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Fish Salad

A salad made with shredded cooked fish, lettuce, celery, mayonnaise, vinegar, parsley, paprika, and optional Worcestershire sauce and onion juice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Fish Salad

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a large bowl, combine the shredded fish, chopped lettuce, and chopped celery.

  2. Add the mayonnaise, vinegar, chopped parsley, and paprika, and mix well.

  3. For extra flavor, add a few drops of Worcestershire sauce and onion juice.

  4. Garnish with cold boiled beets, pieces of hard-boiled egg, and lemon slices.

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 + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  2. Lettuce + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,033 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Lettuce + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,483 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Lettuce + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,562 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

Fish
Forms the main body of the salad and supplies the protein bulk.
Mayonnaise
Adds fat and creaminess that binds the salad together and carries flavour.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the rich mayonnaise.
Celery
Adds a crisp texture that contrasts with the soft fish and dressing.
Lettuce
Adds crisp, watery texture and freshness to the salad.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, lettuce, vinegar, celery, parsley, sauce, egg):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Horseradishfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, lettuce, vinegar, celery, parsley, sauce, egg. 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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