Name: Russian Salad Dressing
Ingredients: 1 pint mayonnaise; ½ cup chopped peppers; ½ cup chili sauce; 1 pound chopped capers; 1 tablespoon minced chives; tarragon vinegar to taste; mustard to taste

Why it works: Capers and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 624 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Russian Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Season the mayonnaise with tarragon vinegar and a little mustard.
Add the chopped peppers, chili sauce, chopped capers, and minced chives, then mix all ingredients well.

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.

Capers + mustardtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together624 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Capers + chivetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together245 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Capers + tarragontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together379 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Tarragon + mustardtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together901 recipes

Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
Chive + tarragontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together589 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Mayonnaise: Forms the creamy base and carries the fat and richness of the dressing.
Tarragon vinegar: Adds acidity that brightens the rich mayonnaise and sharpens the flavour.
Chili sauce: Adds sweetness, tang and a reddish colour to the dressing.
Chopped capers: Add a salty, sharp bite that contrasts with the creamy base.
Chopped peppers: Add texture and a fresh, mild vegetable crunch.
Minced chives: Add a mild onion-like aroma and a fresh green note.

Swap the chive

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, sauce, capers, tarragon, vinegar, mustard):

Shallotfits better
Horseradishfits better
Lettucefits better
Chivethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, sauce, capers, tarragon, vinegar, mustard. 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.