Name: Egg Salad
Ingredients: 12 hard-boiled eggs; 2 tablespoons butter; 1 teacup minced ham; 1 teaspoon salt; 1 teaspoon sugar; 1 teaspoon celery seed; 4 tablespoons vinegar

Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Egg Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs

Boil 12 eggs hard, then peel and cut them in half.
Remove the yolks and mash them with butter and minced ham.

Make the filling

Add salt, sugar, celery seed, and vinegar to the mixture.
Mix everything together and fill the egg whites with the mixture.

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.

Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Butter + hamtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,475 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Egg + hamtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,526 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Celery + vinegartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,627 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks: Form the creamy, rich base of the filling that holds the other flavors together.
Butter: Adds fat and richness, helping the mashed yolks become smooth and spreadable.
Minced ham: Adds savory flavor and a chewy texture to the filling.
Vinegar: Adds acidity that brightens the rich yolk mixture and balances its richness.
Sugar: Adds a small amount of sweetness that rounds out the vinegar's sharpness.