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Salad

Celery and Chicken Salad in Tomato Cups

A salad of chicken, celery and apple dressed with French dressing and mayonnaise, served in hollowed-out tomatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery and Chicken Salad in Tomato Cups

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Cut the tops off the tomatoes and scoop out the insides, leaving them hollow.

  2. Set the hollowed tomatoes on ice until serving.

Make the salad filling

  1. Cut the celery into very small cubes.

  2. Chop the apple finely and sprinkle with lemon juice.

  3. Chop the chicken coarsely and mix it with the celery and apple.

  4. Add French dressing to the mixture and stir well.

Fill and serve

  1. Fill the tomato cups with the mixture and top each with a heaping tablespoon of mayonnaise.

  2. Garnish with watercress.

  3. In warm weather, cover the tomato cups with cracked ice and coarse sea salt to maintain their shape.

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.

  1. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

  2. Celery + watercresstop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together167 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Tomato + chickentop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,031 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Celery + appletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,155 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  5. Tomato + watercresstop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together158 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

Firm tomatoes
Form the hollow cups that hold the salad filling.
Cooked chicken meat
Provides the main protein and substance of the filling.
Celery
Adds crisp texture to the chicken and apple filling.
Apple
Adds crunch and mild sweetness to the filling.
Mayonnaise
Adds fat and richness, moistening the filling and topping.
French dressing
Adds acidity and seasoning that dress the chicken, celery and apple.

The step that matters

Keeping the tomato cups cold and firm. Tomatoes are mostly water and soften as they warm, so chilling them on ice and keeping them cold until serving helps the cups hold their shape and stay crisp.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, celery, chicken, meat, watercress):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Limefits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, celery, chicken, meat, watercress. 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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