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Herring Salad

A cold salad of salted herring, chopped meat, beetroot, potatoes, apples, cucumbers, onions, eggs, and a creamy dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Herring Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the herring

  1. Soak the salted herrings in cold water to reduce saltiness.

  2. Remove the bones from the herring.

  3. Mince the herring.

Make the salad

  1. Chop the cold meat, beetroot, potato, apple, and cucumber, keeping the total quantity equal to the herring.

  2. Combine the minced herring and chopped ingredients in a bowl.

  3. In a cup, mix cream, sugar, vinegar, and pepper.

  4. Add the mixture to the bowl.

  5. Blend until it reaches a paste-like consistency.

  6. Spread the mixture on a flat dish.

Garnish and serve

  1. Garnish with minced beetroot.

  2. Mince the egg whites and yolks separately for decoration.

  3. Arrange the egg garnishes in the center and around the border.

  4. Add a fringe of small pickled onions.

  5. Serve with a sauce of cream, vinegar, mustard, and sugar, or with oil, vinegar, and pepper.

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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Cucumber + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,050 recipes

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

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Potato + cucumbertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together481 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Salted herrings
Provide the main fish flavour and the bulk of the salad's body.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, moist texture that binds the chopped ingredients.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and balances the fish and cream.
Boiled potatoes
Add starch and softness, helping the mixture hold a spreadable paste-like texture.
Beetroot
Adds colour and an earthy sweetness to the salad and its garnish.

The step that matters

Soak the salted herrings. Salt is drawn out by soaking in cold water. Too short a soak leaves the salad overly salty, while too long can leave the fish bland, so tasting during soaking matters.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, egg, potato, cucumber, onion, sugar, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, egg, potato, cucumber, onion, sugar, pepper. 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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