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Chicken Salad

A chilled chicken salad with celery, dressing, eggs, olives, and cucumber pickles served over greens.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Chicken Salad

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 ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Let the chicken sit in the cooking water until cold.

  2. If using cold roast poultry, cut it up and moisten with chicken broth or water mixed with vinegar, pepper, and salt.

Assemble and serve

  1. Mix equal parts of cut-up chicken and celery with a few spoonfuls of salad dressing.

  2. Arrange the mixture in a bowl and cover with more dressing.

  3. Decorate with sliced eggs, olives, and cucumber pickle.

  4. Serve with lettuce or other tender salad greens.

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. Cucumber + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,409 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  5. Olive + cucumbertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Cooked chicken
Forms the main body of the salad and provides its savory, meaty bulk.
Celery
Adds crisp texture that contrasts with the soft chicken.
Salad dressing
Supplies moisture and richness that bind the chicken and celery together.
Eggs
Add creamy texture and mild richness as a garnish.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor of the chicken.

The step that matters

Moistening the cut-up chicken. Cooked chicken dries out quickly once cut and exposed to air. Moistening it with broth or water mixed with vinegar helps it stay tender and carry the dressing evenly.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, vinegar, pepper, egg, olive, cucumber, lettuce):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, vinegar, pepper, egg, olive, cucumber, 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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