Name: Chicken Sandwich
Ingredients: 1 cup chopped chicken; 1 cup chopped walnuts; mayonnaise dressing; lettuce leaves; thinly sliced buttered bread

Why it works: Walnut and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 491 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Chicken Sandwich

Ingredients

Directions

Mix the chopped chicken and chopped walnuts with mayonnaise dressing in a bowl.
Spread the mixture on a lettuce leaf.
Place the lettuce leaf between two slices of thinly sliced buttered bread.

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.

Walnut + lettucetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together491 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Chicken + breadtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,258 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).
Lettuce + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together602 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,421 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Chicken + walnuttop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together469 recipes

Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken: Provides the main protein and bulk of the sandwich filling.
Walnuts: Add crunch and a nutty flavour that contrasts with the soft chicken.
Mayonnaise dressing: Adds moisture and richness, binding the chicken and walnuts together.
Lettuce leaves: Add crispness and a fresh layer that keeps the bread from soaking up the filling.
Bread: Gives the sandwich its structure and holds the filling in place.