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Salad

Cold Slaw

A chilled cabbage salad with a creamy mustard dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Cold Slaw

Why it works: Cabbage and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,645 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cold Slaw

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dressing

  1. Shred the cabbage and place it in a large bowl.

  2. In a saucepan, combine cream and red pepper vinegar.

  3. Beat the eggs and stir them into the vinegar mixture.

  4. Add mustard, salt, butter, and sugar to the saucepan.

  5. Heat the mixture over medium heat until it thickens slightly, without curdling.

  6. Remove from heat and let it cool completely.

Dress and serve

  1. Pour the cooled mixture over the cabbage and mix well.

  2. Add chopped celery if desired for extra flavor.

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.

  1. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  2. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 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
Thicken the dressing as they heat and set gently, giving it a creamy body.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy texture to the dressing.
Red pepper vinegar
Provides acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the sugar.
Yellow sugar
Adds sweetness that offsets the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard.
Cabbage
Forms the bulk of the slaw, providing crisp texture that holds the dressing.

The step that matters

Heating the dressing without curdling. Eggs thicken as their proteins set with heat, but overheating causes them to scramble and curdle. Heat gently over medium heat, stirring, and stop once it thickens slightly.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

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