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Salad

Salads, Sauces, and Pickles

A potato and egg salad flavored with mustard, olive oil, vinegar, anchovy sauce, and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Anchovy and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,057 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Salads, Sauces, and Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Powder the hard-boiled eggs and set aside.

  2. Pass the boiled potatoes through a sieve for smoothness.

Mix the salad

  1. Combine the eggs, potatoes, and chopped onion in a bowl.

  2. Add the mustard and mix well.

  3. Season with coarse sea salt to taste.

  4. Stir in the olive oil and vinegar.

  5. Finally, add the anchovy sauce and mix until well combined.

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. Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

  3. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  4. Potato + olivetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,458 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 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

Hard-boiled eggs
Provide a soft, crumbly body that gives the salad its bulk and texture.
Potatoes
Form the creamy base, with sieving producing a smooth, even texture.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that cuts through the richness of the eggs and oil.
Olive oil
Adds fat and richness, carrying flavour and giving a silky mouthfeel.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the salad and balances the fat.
Anchovy sauce
Adds deep savoury, salty umami flavour to the salad.

The step that matters

Pass the boiled potatoes through a sieve. Potatoes turn gluey if overworked, but sieving while they are still warm breaks up the cells gently. This keeps the mash smooth and light instead of sticky.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, onion, mustard, olive, vinegar, anchovy, sauce):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, onion, mustard, olive, vinegar, anchovy, sauce. 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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