Name: Onion Salad
Ingredients: 2 onions; 1 small bunch of radishes; 1 turnip, sliced finely; 2 tablespoons finely ground peanuts; oil (to taste); lime juice (to taste); cabbage leaves (for serving); celery leaves (for garnish); a pinch of savory herbs

Why it works: Radish and turnip share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 35 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Onion Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Finely slice the onions, radishes, and turnip.
Mix the sliced vegetables thoroughly in a bowl.

Dress and serve

Add the finely ground peanuts, oil, and lime juice to the mixture.
Serve the salad on large cabbage leaves, garnished with celery leaves and a pinch of savory herbs.

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.

Radish + turniptop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together35 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Turnip + cabbagetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together897 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,418 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Radish + cabbagetop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together106 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Radish + limetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together53 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Onions: Provide the main sharp, savory flavour and crisp bulk of the salad.
Radishes: Add crisp texture and a peppery bite to the vegetable mixture.
Turnip: Adds crunch and a mild, slightly sweet body to the salad.
Finely ground peanuts: Add nutty richness and a fine, slightly gritty texture to the dressing.
Lime juice: Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the oil.

Swap the peanut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, radish, turnip, lime, cabbage, celery):

Lentilsfits better
Beansfits better
Chickpeafits better
Peanutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, radish, turnip, lime, cabbage, celery. 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.