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Salad

Red, White and Green Salad

A salad of celery, tomatoes, and green peppers served on lettuce with optional cheese and mayonnaise.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,033 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Red, White and Green Salad

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine equal portions of sliced celery, tomatoes, and green peppers in a bowl.

  2. If desired, add grated cheese to the mixture.

  3. Serve the salad on a bed of lettuce and drizzle with mayonnaise.

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. Celery + lettucetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,033 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  2. Celery + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Tomato + lettucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,655 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 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

Celery
Adds crisp texture and a fresh, mild crunch to the salad.
Tomatoes
Contribute juiciness and moisture, plus a bright, slightly acidic flavour.
Green peppers
Add crunch and a grassy, slightly bitter note that contrasts the tomatoes.
Mayonnaise
Adds fat and richness, coating the vegetables and softening their sharp edges.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, tomato, pepper, cheese):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, tomato, pepper, cheese. 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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