Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Potato Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Boil the potatoes until tender.
Peel the potatoes and slice them.
Peel the onion and slice it very thin.
Assemble
In a bowl, combine the sliced potatoes and onion.
Add plenty of plain salad dressing and mix well.
Optionally, stir in chopped parsley, green onions, lettuce, or fried salt pork.
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.
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Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,023 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Parsley + lettucetop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,483 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
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Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,855 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Potato + porktop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,668 recipes
Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).
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Potato + lettucetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together322 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Potatoes
- Form the bulk of the salad and absorb the dressing's moisture and flavour.
- Onion
- Adds sharp, aromatic flavour that cuts through the richness of the dressing.
- Plain salad dressing
- Coats the potatoes and onion, supplying moisture, fat and tang.
The step that matters
Slice the potatoes while they are still warm. Warm potatoes are firmer and hold their shape when sliced, and they absorb dressing more readily. Cold, crumbly potatoes break apart and turn the salad mushy.
Swap the onion
The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, parsley, lettuce, pork):
- Chivefits better
- Beetrootfits better
- Turnipfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against potato, parsley, lettuce, pork. 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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