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Salad

Sauerkraut Salad, German Style

A salad of sauerkraut and shredded red cabbage with butter, vinegar, horseradish, chervil, onions, olives, and beets.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Horseradish and chervil share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Sauerkraut Salad, German Style

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Parboil the sauerkraut for 20 minutes.

  2. Drain and rinse with cold water.

  3. Drain again using a napkin.

  4. Cut the red cabbage into fine shreds.

  5. Place the shredded cabbage in a saucepan with butter.

  6. Add vinegar.

  7. Cook over high heat for 5 minutes.

  8. Drain.

  9. Chop the onion.

  10. Blanch the onion in boiling water for 1 minute.

  11. Immerse the onion in cold water.

  12. Drain the onion.

Assemble and serve

  1. In a bowl, combine the sauerkraut, red cabbage, onion, horseradish, and chervil.

  2. Season with salt, pepper, and vinegar.

  3. Mix well.

  4. Arrange in a salad bowl.

  5. Garnish with olives and beets.

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. Horseradish + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together20 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cabbage + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together481 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  4. Cabbage + cherviltop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together113 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Onion + horseradishtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,784 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

Sauerkraut
Provides the main body and tangy sour flavour of the salad.
Red cabbage
Adds crisp texture and colour, softened slightly by cooking in butter and vinegar.
Butter
Adds fat and richness while the cabbage cooks.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the salad and helps keep the cabbage colour bright.
White onion
Contributes mild sharpness and aroma, mellowed by blanching.
Horseradish
Adds a sharp, pungent heat that cuts through the richness.

The step that matters

Blanch the onion, then cool it fully. Brief blanching in boiling water mellows the onion's harsh sulphur bite, and the cold-water dip stops further cooking so it stays crisp and does not turn soft or bitter in the salad.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, butter, vinegar, horseradish, chervil, pepper, olive):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, butter, vinegar, horseradish, chervil, pepper, olive. 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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