Why it works: Celery and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓
Celery Salad
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Wash and scrape the white parts of the celery.
Cut the celery into lengths and shred it very finely.
Soak the shreds in cold water for about 1 hour until they curl.
Dress and serve
Drain the celery well and toss it in the French dressing.
Pile the salad in a dish and sprinkle with chopped parsley.
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.
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Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,810 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Celery
- Forms the crisp, fibrous base of the salad and provides its main texture.
- French dressing
- Adds acidity and oil that coat the shreds and carry the flavour.
The step that matters
Drain the celery well before dressing. Water left on the shreds would dilute the French dressing and make the salad watery and bland. Thorough draining lets the dressing cling to the celery.
“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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