Skip to main content
Main

Chicken Salad

A chilled salad of diced chicken, celery, and mayonnaise dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Chicken Salad

Why it works: Parsley and celery 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 ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the chicken

  1. Place the chicken in boiling water with the onion, bay leaf, cloves, and parsley.

  2. Cover and simmer until tender.

  3. Remove the skin from the chicken.

  4. Cut the meat into dice, preferably using only the white meat.

  5. Store the diced chicken in a cool place until needed.

Prepare the celery

  1. Wash and cut the celery into half‑inch pieces.

  2. Soak the celery in cold water and keep cool until ready to use.

  3. For every pint of chicken, use 2/3 pint of celery and 1 1/2 cups of mayonnaise dressing.

  4. When ready to serve, dry the celery.

Assemble and serve

  1. Mix the celery with the chicken.

  2. Season lightly with salt and pepper.

  3. Thoroughly mix in the mayonnaise.

  4. Optionally, add 1 cup of whipped cream to every half pint of mayonnaise for a lighter dressing.

  5. Serve on a cold dish, garnished with white celery tips.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Clove + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the main protein and bulk of the salad, cooked until tender and then diced.
Celery
Adds crisp texture that contrasts with the soft chicken and dressing.
Mayonnaise dressing
Binds the chicken and celery together and adds richness and moisture.
Whipped cream
Lightens the dressing and makes it creamier when added in the optional step.

The step that matters

Thoroughly mix in the mayonnaise. Dry celery and chicken let the dressing coat evenly; wet celery thins the mayonnaise and makes the salad watery.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, onion, parsley, celery, pepper, cream):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, onion, parsley, celery, pepper, cream. 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.

More chicken salad recipes

Dressing 31Sandwich 8with Mayonnaise 6Cream Cheese 5Moulded 5Chinese 4 See all 638 →

You might also like

Chicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesChicken SoupChicken Soup156 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesCreamed ChickenCreamed Chicken89 recipes