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Herring Salad

A salad of chopped herring, boiled chicken, apple, ham, pickled cucumbers, potatoes, beets, eggs, mixed with mustard, sugar, chicken oil, salt, pepper, and herring roe.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,281 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Herring Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the herring

  1. Soak the herring overnight.

  2. Remove the skin and bones and chop the herring finely.

Make the salad

  1. Cut the boiled chicken, apple, boiled ham, pickled cucumbers, boiled potatoes, boiled beets, and hard boiled eggs into very small squares.

  2. In a bowl, mix the mustard, sugar, chicken oil, salt, pepper, and soft roe of the herring.

  3. Add vinegar to moisten the mixture well.

  4. Reserve some of the egg, beet, and pickle for decorating the salad, chopping them very fine.

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. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  2. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

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

  3. Chicken + potatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,756 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-decenal (green, must).

  4. Cucumber + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together481 recipes

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

  5. Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Herring
Provides the main fish flavour and the bulk of the salad's texture.
Soft roe of the herring
Adds richness and a creamy texture that binds the mixture together.
Hard boiled eggs
Add a soft, creamy texture and mild richness to the chopped salad.
Pickled cucumbers
Add acidity that balances the fish and fat in the salad.
Boiled potatoes
Add starchy bulk and a soft texture that absorbs the dressing.
Mustard
Adds sharpness that cuts through the richness of the fish and oil.

The step that matters

Add vinegar to moisten the mixture well. Vinegar seasons and moistens the chopped ingredients evenly; adding too little leaves the salad dry and bland, while too much can make it sour and soggy. Add it gradually and mix thoroughly.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, ham, cucumber, potato, egg, mustard, sugar):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Pumpkinfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, ham, cucumber, potato, egg, mustard, 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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