Name: Asparagus Salad
Ingredients: 1 lb cold cooked asparagus, tips only; 1 cucumber, thinly sliced; 1 teaspoon salt; mayonnaise; lettuce

Why it works: Cucumber and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,409 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Asparagus Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Combine asparagus tips and cucumber slices in a bowl.
Let the mixture stand in cold water for 1 hour.

Season and serve

Add salt and mix lightly.
Serve on a bed of lettuce, topped with mayonnaise.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Cucumber + lettucetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,409 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Asparagus + lettucetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together313 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Asparagus + cucumbertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together203 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

Asparagus tips: Provides the main crisp, tender texture and the vegetable base of the salad.
Cucumber: Adds moisture and a crisp, cool texture to the salad.
Mayonnaise: Adds fat and creamy richness that coats the vegetables and softens the flavour.