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Salad

Salad of Asparagus

A salad of boiled asparagus dressed with mustard vinaigrette and lemon slices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Salad of Asparagus

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the asparagus

  1. Scale and cut off the heads of the asparagus.

  2. Boil the asparagus until nearly done, then strain.

  3. Place the asparagus in cold water for 5 minutes, then drain well.

Make and serve the salad

  1. Arrange the asparagus in rows on a dish and place lemon slices around the rim.

  2. Mix the mustard, oil, vinegar, Cayenne pepper, and salt together.

  3. Pour the dressing over the asparagus 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.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Asparagus + mustardtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together213 recipes

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

  3. Asparagus + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together704 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 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

Asparagus
Forms the main body of the salad and is cooked until nearly tender before chilling.
Mustard
Adds sharp flavor and helps emulsify the oil and vinegar into the dressing.
Oil
Carries flavor and gives the dressing a smooth, rich mouthfeel.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the oil.

The step that matters

Pour the dressing over the asparagus just before serving. Acid in the vinegar and salt in the dressing gradually soften and dull the asparagus if it sits too long, so dressing late keeps the spears crisp and bright.

Swap the asparagus

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, mustard, vinegar, pepper):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Broccolifits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Asparagusthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, mustard, vinegar, pepper. 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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