Name: Salad
Ingredients: 2 hard-boiled eggs; 1 teaspoon mustard; 2 tablespoons vinegar; 1 cup milk; 2 heads celery; ½ cup sugar

Why it works: Mustard and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Chop the hard-boiled eggs.
In a bowl, mix the mustard, vinegar, and milk.

Combine and serve

Add the chopped eggs, chopped celery, and sugar to the mixture, then stir until well combined.
Serve chilled.

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.

Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,169 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Vinegar + celerytop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,627 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 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

Eggs: Provide the main body and rich texture of the salad.
Mustard: Adds a sharp, pungent flavour that cuts through the richness of the eggs.
Vinegar: Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the richness.
Milk: Adds moisture and creaminess to the dressing.
Celery: Adds crisp texture and a fresh, vegetal note.
Sugar: Adds sweetness that softens the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, mustard, vinegar, milk, sugar):

Cinnamonfits better
Tarragonfits better
Capersfits better
Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, mustard, vinegar, milk, sugar. 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.