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Salad

French Salad

A salad of finely chopped anchovies, shallot, parsley, vinegar, oil, mustard, salt, and thin slices of cold roast or boiled meat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 859 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

French Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the dressing

  1. Chop the anchovies, shallot, and parsley very finely.

  2. Combine them in a bowl with vinegar, oil, mustard, and salt, and mix the ingredients well.

Assemble and chill

  1. Add thin slices of cold roast or boiled meat, about 3 inches long, and shake them into the seasoning.

  2. Cover the dish and refrigerate for 3 hours before serving.

  3. Garnish with parsley and slices of cold fat.

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. Shallot + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together859 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Parsley + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,588 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Shallot + vinegartop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Anchovies
Provide a salty, savoury depth that seasons the whole salad.
Shallot
Adds a sharp, aromatic bite to the dressing.
Vinegar
Supplies acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the oil.
Oil
Carries flavour and adds richness and moisture to the dressing.
Mustard
Adds sharpness and helps the oil and vinegar stay emulsified.
Cold roast or cold boiled meat
Forms the main body of the salad, absorbing the seasoned dressing as it chills.

The step that matters

Chopping the anchovies, shallot, and parsley very finely. Fine pieces spread evenly through the dressing and release their flavour into the oil and vinegar, so each bite tastes seasoned rather than having harsh, chunky bits of shallot or anchovy.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (shallot, vinegar, mustard, meat):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against shallot, vinegar, mustard, meat. 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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