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Salad

Parisian Salad

A chilled salad of sliced vegetables arranged in a crown with aspic jelly and mayonnaise.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and beetroot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 336 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Parisian Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Cut the carrots and turnips into rounds 1 inch long and ½ inch in diameter.

  2. Slice the asparagus heads and tinned French beans to the same length.

  3. Slice the potatoes and beetroot into rounds ½ inch thick, then cut these rounds into quarters.

Make the crown and set it

  1. Spread a little liquid aspic jelly on the bottom of a dish and arrange the potato and beetroot triangles in a crown shape.

  2. Place the dish on ice until set.

Assemble the salad

  1. In a bowl, mix the liquid aspic jelly with mushrooms, French beans, asparagus points, peas, pickled cauliflower, and celery.

  2. Fill the crown with this mixture, creating a slight hollow in the center.

  3. Cover with mayonnaise, avoiding the potato and beetroot crown.

  4. Fill the center with the tossed carrots, turnips, beans, and season with oil, lemon juice, pepper, and salt.

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. Turnip + beetroottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together336 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Asparagus + beanstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together292 recipes

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

  4. Beans + beetroottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together215 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  5. Turnip + asparagustop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together328 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the firm, neat crown that holds the salad's shape and structure.
Beetroot
Adds colour contrast and a mild earthy flavour to the crown.
Liquid aspic jelly
Sets on chilling to bind the vegetables and hold the crown together.
Mayonnaise
Adds richness and moisture, coating the vegetables with fat and creaminess.
Carrots
Contribute crisp texture and natural sweetness to the centre filling.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the vegetables.

The step that matters

Setting the crown on ice. The aspic must be fully set before the filling goes in, otherwise the potato and beetroot crown slumps and the layers mix together. Chilling firms the gelatine so the shape holds.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, asparagus, beans, potato, beetroot, mushroom):

  1. Lentilsfits better
  2. Chickpeafits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, asparagus, beans, potato, beetroot, mushroom. 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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