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Egg Salad

Egg salad made with hard-boiled eggs, sweet pickles, vinegar, sugar, mustard, cayenne pepper, cornstarch, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Egg Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dressing

  1. Chop the hard-boiled eggs and sweet pickles into small dice.

  2. Combine vinegar, water, sugar, salt, and butter in a saucepan. Boil the mixture for a few minutes.

  3. Pour the hot mixture over the beaten yolks of 2 eggs. Boil for a few more minutes.

  4. Add cayenne pepper and mustard mixed in water. Stir in cornstarch mixed in water. Boil for a few minutes.

  5. Remove from heat. Pour the mixture into the beaten whites of 2 eggs. Set aside to cool.

Assemble and serve

  1. Once cooled, pour the dressing over the diced eggs and pickles. Fold in whipped cream to taste.

  2. Garnish with finely cut lettuce 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. Mustard + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

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

  2. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 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

Eggs
Yolks thicken the dressing and whites bind it into a cooked custard base.
Cornstarch
Starch thickens the hot vinegar mixture so the dressing becomes smooth and clingy.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the dressing its tang.
Whipped cream
Adds fat and lightness, softening the dressing's sharpness and making it creamy.
Sweet pickles
Add sweetness and crunch to the diced salad.

The step that matters

Pour the hot mixture over the beaten yolks, then boil again. Egg yolks can scramble if they meet very hot liquid too quickly. Pouring slowly while whisking, then returning to a boil, lets the yolks thicken the dressing smoothly.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, vinegar, sugar, butter, pepper, mustard, cream):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, vinegar, sugar, butter, pepper, mustard, cream. 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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