Name: Mayonnaise of Salmon
Ingredients: Cold salmon; 4 hard-boiled eggs; 4 small lettuces; Mixed salad; Cucumber; Beetroot mayonnaise sauce

Why it works: Lettuce and beetroot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 678 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Mayonnaise of Salmon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Thoroughly wash and dry the lettuces, then cut them into quarters.
Remove the hearts and lay the remaining leaves on the serving dish.
Cut the salmon into neat pieces about 2 inches square.

Assemble

Arrange some pieces in a circle in the center of the lettuce leaves and coat them thickly with mayonnaise sauce.
Layer more pieces on top in a smaller ring and coat these with sauce.
Continue layering until all the fish is used up.

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.

Lettuce + beetroottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together678 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).
Lettuce + cucumbertop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,409 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Cucumber + beetroottop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together345 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Salmon + cucumbertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together513 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Salmon + eggtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,485 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Salmon: Forms the main body of the dish and provides its flavor and flaky texture.
Beetroot mayonnaise sauce: Adds moisture and richness, binding the layers and coating the fish.
Lettuces: Provides a crisp, fresh base that holds the fish and sauce.

Swap the beetroot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, egg, lettuce, cucumber, sauce):

Chivefits better
Mustardfits about as well
Horseradishfits about as well
Beetrootthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, egg, lettuce, cucumber, sauce. 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.