Name: Pear Salad
Ingredients: 1 pear; 1 apple, chopped; 1 stalk celery, chopped; mayonnaise; chopped walnuts, for garnish; maraschino cherries, for garnish

Why it works: Pear and apple match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 649 recipes. Both carry isoamyl acetate, which smells banana, fruity. The science ↓

Pear Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Pare and slice the pear, removing the stem and part of the center.
Fill the space with mixed chopped apple and celery, then add mayonnaise.
Garnish with chopped walnuts and maraschino cherries.

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.

Pear + appletop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together649 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).
Celery + walnuttop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together852 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Pear + walnuttop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together190 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Apple + celerytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,155 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).
Apple + walnuttop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,051 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Pear: Forms the base shell that holds the filling and provides the fruity body of the salad.
Apple: Adds crisp texture and mild sweetness to the filling.
Celery: Contributes crunch and a fresh, slightly savory bite to the filling.
Mayonnaise: Binds the chopped filling together and adds richness and moisture.