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Salad

Chicken Salad.

A dressing of egg yolks, butter or oil, mustard, salt, celery seed, vinegar, mixed with chopped chicken and celery.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Chicken Salad.

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 ↓

Chicken Salad.

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. Beat the egg yolks in a bowl.

  2. Add melted butter or olive oil, mustard, salt, and celery seed; mix thoroughly.

  3. Gradually stir in the vinegar.

  4. Place the mixture over low heat, stirring constantly until thickened like custard.

Assemble the salad

  1. Pour the dressing over the chopped chicken.

  2. Just before serving, mix in the chopped celery.

  3. Adjust seasoning with more mustard and cayenne pepper if desired.

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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Mustard + chickentop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  4. Celery + chickentop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Butter + chickentop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify the fat and thicken the dressing as they set over gentle heat.
Butter or olive oil
Adds richness and body, carrying flavour through the dressing.
Mixed mustard
Adds sharpness and helps emulsify the dressing so it stays smooth.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the rich yolks.
Cooked chicken
Forms the main body of the salad, absorbing the dressing.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and fresh flavour to the salad.

The step that matters

Place the mixture over low heat, stirring constantly until thickened like custard.. Egg yolks thicken when heated gently, but too much heat or too little stirring can scramble them. Constant stirring over low heat keeps the dressing smooth and creamy.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, mustard, vinegar, chicken. 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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