Name: Chicken Salad
Ingredients: cold roasted chicken; 1 or 2 lettuce leaves; 3 anchovies; 1 egg; 1 heaping teaspoon dry mustard

Why it works: Lettuce and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Chicken Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Cut the cold roasted chicken into pieces.
Trim the outside of the lettuce leaves and tear them into pieces.
Place the lettuce pieces in a salad bowl with the chicken.
Skin and bone the anchovies, then cut them into thin strips.
Lay the anchovy strips over the chicken.

Make the dressing

Beat the egg.
Mix the beaten egg with the dry mustard.

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.

Lettuce + mustardtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,356 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,192 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).
Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,421 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Egg + mustardtop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,210 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Chicken + eggtop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,991 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold roasted chicken: Forms the bulk of the salad and provides its main protein.
Egg: Beaten with mustard to help bind and enrich the dressing.
Dry mustard: Adds a sharp, pungent flavour to the dressing.
Anchovies: Contribute a salty, savoury depth to the salad.