Skip to main content
Salad

Salmon Salad

A chilled salad of salmon, celery, nuts, eggs, and a mustard‑vinegar dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Salmon Salad

Why it works: Celery and mustard 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 ↓

Salmon Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine the chopped salmon, celery, walnuts, and hard boiled eggs.

  2. In a double boiler, mix the beaten eggs, sugar, salt, pepper, mustard, and vinegar.

  3. Cook until thickened.

Dress and serve

  1. Pour the dressing over the salmon mixture and mix well.

  2. Add sliced pickles 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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Celery + walnuttop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together852 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Walnut + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together849 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Beaten eggs thicken the vinegar dressing as they cook, binding it into a creamy coating.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances the richness of the salmon and eggs.
Salmon
Provides the main protein and flavor, forming the body of the salad.
Walnuts
Add crunch and a nutty flavor that contrasts with the soft salmon and dressing.

The step that matters

Cook the dressing until thickened. Beaten eggs can curdle or scramble if heated too fast. Gentle heat in a double boiler lets the egg proteins set slowly into a smooth, thick dressing.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, celery, egg, sugar, pepper, mustard, vinegar):

  1. Sesamefits better
  2. Beansfits about as well
  3. Lentilsfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, celery, egg, sugar, pepper, mustard, vinegar. 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.

More salmon salad recipes

Dressing 4Jellied 3 See all 153 →

You might also like

Chicken SaladChicken Salad623 recipesSalad DressingSalad Dressing491 recipesTomato SaladTomato Salad179 recipesCold SlawCold Slaw160 recipes