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Salad

Salmon Salad

A salad of chopped salmon or chicken mixed with celery or cabbage, bound with egg yolks, mustard, butter, vinegar, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Salmon Salad

Why it works: Mustard and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Salmon Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. Rub the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs fine and mix with one raw yolk.

  2. Add a pinch of sugar, salt, mustard, melted butter, and vinegar; adjust vinegar to taste.

Assemble and serve

  1. Chop the salmon or chicken and the celery or cabbage finely.

  2. Mix all ingredients well and pour the mixture over just before serving.

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. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Butter + salmontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  5. Egg + salmontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,485 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify with butter and mustard to form a thick, creamy dressing.
Melted butter
Adds richness and smoothness to the dressing.
Prepared mustard
Helps emulsify the dressing and adds a sharp flavour.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness.
Salmon or chicken
Provides the main protein and substance of the salad.
Celery or white cabbage
Adds crunch and bulk to the salad.

The step that matters

Pour the dressing over just before serving. Acid and salt in the dressing draw moisture out of the celery or cabbage, so it softens and loses crispness if left standing. Dressing it at the last moment keeps the vegetables crisp.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, sugar, mustard, butter, vinegar, salmon):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Dillfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar, mustard, butter, vinegar, salmon. 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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