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Salad

Corn Salad

A sweet and tangy salad of corn, cabbage, mango, pickles, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard 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 ↓

Corn Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the relish

  1. In a large pot, combine the corn and cider vinegar.

  2. Add sugar and cook for 20 minutes.

  3. Stir in the cabbage and cook for an additional 5 minutes.

  4. Add the remaining ingredients and cook for 5 minutes longer.

Jar and seal

  1. Seal the mixture in pint-sized jars while very hot.

  2. Pour paraffin on top and seal the lids.

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 + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  3. Cabbage + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,840 recipes

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

  4. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

Corn
Provides the bulk and tender, sweet body of the relish.
Cider vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that brightens the relish and helps keep it stable.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Cabbage
Contributes crisp texture that holds up through cooking.
Celery
Adds crunch and a fresh, vegetal note.
Sweet red mangoes
Adds fruity sweetness and color to the mixture.

The step that matters

Sealing the jars while the mixture is very hot. Filling jars while the relish is very hot drives air out of the jars as they cool, helping create a vacuum seal. Sealing promptly reduces the chance of air and microbes getting in, which is what keeps the relish safe to store.

Swap the mango

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (corn, cider, vinegar, cabbage, sugar, celery, mustard):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Applefits better
  3. Lemonfits about as well
  4. Mangothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, cider, vinegar, cabbage, sugar, celery, mustard. 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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