Name: Chicken Salad
Ingredients: 1 whole chicken; ⅓ small head of cabbage; 3 hard boiled eggs; ⅓ cup vinegar; 1 tablespoon melted butter; 2 teaspoons mustard; salt to taste; pepper to taste

Why it works: Cabbage and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,645 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Boil the chicken until tender.
Chop the cabbage and hard boiled eggs finely.

Make and serve

In a bowl, mix the chopped cabbage, eggs, vinegar, melted butter, mustard, salt, and pepper.
Combine with the shredded chicken and serve.

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.

Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,645 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,081 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,192 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken: Provides the main protein bulk of the salad, cooked until tender and then shredded.
Cabbage: Adds crisp texture and body to the salad.
Hard boiled eggs: Add richness and creamy body to the salad.
Vinegar: Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the richness.
Melted butter: Adds fat for richness and a smoother mouthfeel.
Mustard: Adds sharp flavor that balances the richness of the eggs and butter.

Swap the cabbage

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

Capsicumfits better
Shallotfits better
Chivefits better
Cabbagethe original

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