Name: Fruit Salad
Ingredients: 4 bananas, peeled and thinly sliced; ½ pound black grapes, well washed and dried; ½ pound strawberries, hulled; 1 apple, peeled and thinly sliced; 2 large oranges; ⅓ cup raspberry syrup; 2 teaspoons brandy

Why it works: Grape and apple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,659 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Fruit Salad

Ingredients

4 bananas, peeled and thinly sliced
½ pound black grapes, well washed and dried
½ pound strawberries, hulled
1 apple, peeled and thinly sliced
2 large oranges
⅓ cup raspberry syrup
2 teaspoons brandy

Directions

Prepare the fruit

Pinch each grape slightly.
Stalk the strawberries.
Peel and slice the apple very thinly.

Combine and chill

Mix all the fruits together in a deep bowl.
Add the raspberry syrup and brandy. Mix well.
Leave the salad on ice until needed.

Serve

Serve with Devonshire cream or brandy butter on the side.

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.

Grape + appletop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,659 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Banana + appletop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together435 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Banana + grapetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together496 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
Grape + orangetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,771 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Banana + raspberrytop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together125 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (fruity, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Bananas: Add natural sweetness and a soft, creamy texture to the salad.
Black grapes: Contribute juice and a sweet, slightly tart flavour to the fruit mix.
Strawberries: Add juicy body, colour and a bright, tangy flavour.
Apple: Adds crisp texture and mild acidity that balances the sweeter fruits.
Oranges: Add citrus juice and acidity, along with sweetness and fresh aroma.
Raspberry syrup: Adds sweetness and fruity flavour, and moistens the salad.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (banana, grape, apple, raspberry, syrup, brandy):

Apricotfits better
Peachfits better
Pearfits better
Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against banana, grape, apple, raspberry, syrup, brandy. 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.