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Salad

Cabbage Salad

A salad made from finely shredded cabbage mixed with a dressing of mayonnaise, sweet cream, salt, pepper, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cabbage Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Divide the cabbage into four parts and wash well in cold water.

  2. Remove wilted leaves and cut out tough parts from the center.

  3. Shred the cabbage very finely with a sharp knife and soak in cold water until crisp.

Make the dressing

  1. Mix salt, sugar, and pepper together, then combine with the dressing.

  2. Gradually add the cream to the dressing.

Assemble and serve

  1. Drain the cabbage and mix it with the dressing before serving.

  2. Optional: Add finely chopped hard-boiled eggs to the salad 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.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Pepper + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Cabbage + sugartop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cabbage + creamtop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together778 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Pepper and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Cabbage
Forms the crisp, bulky body of the salad.
Cooked mayonnaise dressing
Provides fat and creaminess that coat the shredded cabbage.
Sweet cream
Adds richness and softens the dressing's tang.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the salt and tang of the dressing.

The step that matters

Shred the cabbage very finely and soak it in cold water until crisp. Fine shreds have more cut surface, so they absorb water and become crisp. Thick pieces stay tough and chewy, and the cabbage must be drained well so the dressing is not diluted.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, cream, sugar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, cream, 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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