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Chicken Salad

A chilled salad of chopped chicken, celery, eggs, and a vinegar‑flour‑sugar dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Chicken Salad

Why it works: Chicken and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,375 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Combine the salad

  1. In a large bowl, combine the chopped chickens, celery, and eggs.

Make the dressing

  1. In a separate bowl, mix the vinegar, flour, and sugar until smooth.

Combine and serve

  1. Pour the vinegar mixture over the chicken mixture and stir to combine.

  2. Serve chilled.

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. Chicken + celerytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Celery + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,905 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the bulk of the salad and provides its main texture.
Celery
Adds crisp, fresh crunch that contrasts with the softer ingredients.
Eggs
Add richness and a soft, creamy texture to the salad.
Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that brightens the salad.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.

The step that matters

Mix the vinegar, flour, and sugar until smooth. Flour clumps when it meets liquid unless it is whisked in thoroughly. Stirring until smooth prevents pockets of raw flour from ending up in the dressing and spreading unevenly through the salad.

Swap the celery

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

  1. Jalapenofits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, egg, vinegar, flour, sugar. 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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