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Chicken Salad

A salad of chopped chicken, lettuce, and hard boiled eggs, dressed with oil, vinegar, mayonnaise, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Chicken Salad

Why it works: Pepper and lettuce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,037 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a bowl, combine the chopped chicken with oil and vinegar.

  2. Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper, mixing thoroughly.

  3. Add the chopped lettuce, reserving the tender inside leaves, and mix well.

  4. Spread the mixture on a platter and cover with mayonnaise dressing, smoothing it with a knife.

  5. Garnish with the reserved lettuce leaves and quartered hard boiled eggs.

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. Pepper + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 recipes

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

  2. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + lettucetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,370 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,421 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the main body of the salad and provides its protein-rich bulk.
Mayonnaise dressing
Adds moisture and richness, binding the salad and coating the chicken.
Lettuce
Adds crisp texture and fresh bulk to the salad.
Hard boiled eggs
Add creamy texture and richness as a garnish.

Swap the lettuce

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Lettucethe original

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