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Salad

Cream Slaw

A chilled cabbage slaw dressed with sugar, cream, vinegar, celery seed, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,840 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cream Slaw

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine the chopped cabbage and sugar in a large bowl.

  2. Add the thick cream, vinegar, celery seed (or chopped celery), and salt.

  3. Mix the ingredients cold, then beat rapidly with a wooden paddle until it froths.

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. Cabbage + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,840 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Vinegar + celerytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,627 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Thick cream
Adds richness and body, giving the dressing a smooth, creamy texture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and sharpens the flavor of the slaw.
Sugar
Sweetens the dressing and balances the acidity of the vinegar.
Chopped cabbage
Forms the bulk of the slaw, providing crisp texture and substance.

The step that matters

Beating the dressing until it froths. Cream must be cold and beaten to the right point; under-beaten cream stays runny, while over-beating turns it grainy or buttery. Mixing cold keeps the fat firm enough to whip.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cream, vinegar, celery):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cream, vinegar, celery. 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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