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Salad

Ham Salad

A chilled salad of chopped ham and shredded lettuce dressed with a mustard‑sour cream vinaigrette.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Ham Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, mix sour cream, vinegar, pepper, salt, sugar, and mustard.

  2. Cook the mixture over hot water until thickened, then stir in the beaten egg yolks.

  3. Chill the dressing in the refrigerator.

Assemble and serve

  1. In a salad bowl, combine the chopped ham and shredded lettuce.

  2. Pour the dressing over the ham and lettuce, stir well, and serve.

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. Mustard + vinegartop 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. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Ham + mustardtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together747 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold boiled ham
Forms the main protein of the salad, adding savoury flavour and substance.
Lettuce
Provides the crisp, fresh base that the dressing coats.
Egg yolks
Thicken the cooked dressing and give it a rich, smooth body.
Sour cream
Adds creamy richness and body to the dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances its richness.
Made mustard
Adds sharp flavour and aroma to the dressing.

The step that matters

Stirring in the egg yolks after cooking. Egg yolks thicken through gentle heat but scramble if the mixture gets too hot. Cooking over hot water keeps the heat gentle and steady, so the dressing thickens smoothly.

Swap the lettuce

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

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

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