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Salad

Vegetable Salad

A chilled gelatin-based salad with sliced egg, olives, celery, served on lettuce with mayonnaise.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,467 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Vegetable Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gelatine

  1. Dissolve the gelatine in boiling water.

  2. Add cold water, sugar, and lemon juice; mix well.

Set and serve

  1. When the mixture begins to thicken, add the sliced egg, olives, and celery.

  2. Mould the mixture in a small cup and refrigerate until firm.

  3. Serve on lettuce 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.

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. Lemon + celerytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Celery + lettucetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,033 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Olive + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,580 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + olivetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,922 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,559 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Granulated gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, wobbly structure as it cools.
Hard cooked egg
Adds body and a mild, rich flavour to the set salad.
Olives
Add salty, briny flavour that contrasts with the sugar and lemon.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and fresh, slightly savoury flavour.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the sugar.

The step that matters

Add the solids as the mixture begins to thicken. Gelatine starts to set as it cools. If the mixture is already firm, the egg, olives, and celery will not distribute evenly. If it is still runny, the pieces will sink and settle at the bottom instead of staying suspended.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, lemon, egg, olive, lettuce):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, lemon, egg, olive, lettuce. 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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