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Tanqo Salad

A salad of pear halves topped with cheese, lettuce, and a vinaigrette of olive oil, vinegar, mustard, paprika, and chili sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,356 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Prepare the pears

  1. Pare, halve, and core the pears; squeeze lemon juice over them to prevent discoloration.

  2. Place a ball of cream cheese or a few cubes of Roquefort cheese in the cavity of each pear half.

Make the dressing

  1. For the dressing, mix olive oil, vinegar, salt, mustard, paprika, and chili sauce; beat and blend well.

  2. Gradually mix this dressing into the mayonnaise.

  3. Rinse canned pimientos in cold water, dry, and cut into strips.

Assemble and garnish

  1. Set the pear halves on heart leaves of lettuce and pour the dressing over them.

  2. Garnish the salad and dressing with julienne strips of pimientos.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Mustard + lettucetop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,356 recipes

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

  2. Mustard + vinegartop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Lettuce + olivetop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together2,400 recipes

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

  4. Olive + vinegartop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together10,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  5. Olive + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together10,849 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

Mustard and vinegar share little aroma chemistry, yet 14,067 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Pears
Provide the fruity, juicy base that the cheese and dressing are served on.
Cream cheese or roquefort cheese
Adds richness and a creamy, salty contrast to the sweet pear.
Mayonnaise
Gives the dressing body, creaminess, and fat for a smooth coating.
Olive oil
Adds fat and mouthfeel to the dressing, helping it emulsify with the other ingredients.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness of the fats.
Chili sauce
Contributes sweetness, tang, and color to the dressing.

The step that matters

Gradually mix the dressing into the mayonnaise. Adding the oil-and-vinegar dressing slowly lets the mixture emulsify, so it stays smooth and creamy instead of separating or turning greasy.

Flavor stand-ins for the pear

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, mustard, lettuce, sauce, olive, vinegar, lemon):

  1. Avocadobetter flavor fit
  2. Limebetter flavor fit
  3. Orangebetter flavor fit
  4. Pearthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, mustard, lettuce, sauce, olive, vinegar, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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