Skip to main content
Main

Fruit Salad

A fruit salad of grapes, apple, walnuts, dressed with mayonnaise and whipped cream, served on lettuce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Grape and apple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,659 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Fruit Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Cut the grapes in half lengthwise and remove the seeds.

  2. Cut the apple into cubes and sprinkle with lemon juice to prevent discoloration.

Assemble and serve

  1. Mix the apple with the grapes and add the sliced walnuts.

  2. Combine the mayonnaise dressing with the whipped cream and mix well.

  3. Arrange the salad in a nest of lettuce leaves 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.

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. Grape + appletop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,659 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Walnut + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together491 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Grape + walnuttop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  4. Lemon + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,559 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Lemon + walnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,149 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Tart apple
Provides the cubed fruit base with a tart flavour that balances the sweetness.
Malaga grapes
Add sweetness and juiciness as the main fruit in the salad.
Mayonnaise dressing
Adds richness and fat that coats the fruit and binds the dressing together.
Whipped cream
Lightens the dressing and adds a soft, airy texture.
English walnuts
Contribute crunch and a nutty flavour against the soft fruit.

The step that matters

Sprinkle the apple with lemon juice right after cutting. Cut apple flesh oxidises and browns quickly on exposure to air. Lemon juice's acidity slows this enzymatic browning, keeping the apple pale and fresh-looking until serving.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (grape, apple, walnut, cream, lettuce):

  1. Pearfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Cherryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against grape, apple, walnut, cream, lettuce. 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.

More fruit salad recipes

Dressing 41Ambrosia 24Pineapple 21Grape 15Frozen 10Mixed 8 See all 267 →

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesApple SoupApple Soup33 recipesCreamy Lettuce SoupCreamy Lettuce Soup8 recipesLettuce SoupLettuce Soup8 recipes