Name: Pineapple and Tomato Salad
Ingredients: firm ripe tomatoes; canned Hawaiian pineapple; heart-lettuce leaves; mayonnaise

Why it works: Tomato and lettuce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,655 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pineapple and Tomato Salad

Ingredients

firm ripe tomatoes
canned Hawaiian pineapple
heart-lettuce leaves
mayonnaise

Directions

Peel and chill the tomatoes.
Cut the tomatoes into ⅓ inch slices.
Layer a slice of tomato over a slice of chilled pineapple.
Arrange on a bed of heart-lettuce leaves.
Top with mayonnaise.

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.

Tomato + lettucetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,655 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pineapple + lettucetop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together271 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Tomato + pineappletop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together306 recipes

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