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Chicken Salad

A salad of diced chicken, celery, olives, capers, and homemade mayonnaise, served on lettuce leaves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Chicken Salad

Why it works: Olive and capers match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,688 recipes mention both. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. In a bowl, mix the diced chicken, chopped celery, olives, and capers thoroughly.

  2. In a separate bowl, whisk together olive oil, vinegar, salt, and cayenne for the dressing.

  3. Pour the dressing over the chicken mixture and set aside.

Make the mayonnaise

  1. To make the mayonnaise, combine egg yolks in a plate and gradually add olive oil while stirring with a fork.

  2. As the mixture thickens, thin it with lemon juice until it reaches a creamy consistency.

  3. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serve

  1. Form a mound with the chicken salad, pour the mayonnaise over it, and garnish with lettuce leaves.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Olive + caperstop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,688 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Celery + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together16,012 recipes

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

  5. Capers + lemontop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,222 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Boiled chicken
Forms the bulk of the salad and provides its main protein and texture.
Egg yolks
Emulsify with the oil to form the creamy mayonnaise that binds the dish.
Olive oil
Carries flavor and gives the dressing and mayonnaise their richness and smooth texture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances the rich oil.
Celery
Adds crisp texture that contrasts with the soft chicken.

The step that matters

Adding the olive oil to the egg yolks. Oil must be added slowly while stirring so it emulsifies into the yolks. Adding it too fast can break the mixture, leaving it oily and separated instead of creamy.

Flavor stand-ins for the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, olive, capers, vinegar, egg, lemon, pepper):

  1. Tarragonbetter flavor fit
  2. Parsleybetter flavor fit
  3. Dillbetter flavor fit
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, olive, capers, vinegar, egg, lemon, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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Dressing 31Sandwich 8with Mayonnaise 6Cream Cheese 5Moulded 5Chinese 4 See all 638 →

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