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Chicken Salad, No. 1

A salad of cooked chicken and hard‑boiled eggs dressed with butter, mustard, Worcestershire sauce, vinegar, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Chicken Salad, No. 1

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine the chopped chicken and hard-boiled eggs in a bowl.

  2. In a separate bowl, mix the softened butter, mustard, sugar, salt, black pepper, Worcestershire sauce, and vinegar until well combined.

  3. Stir the dressing into the chicken and egg mixture until evenly coated.

Adjust

  1. If the salad is not moist enough, add an additional tablespoon of softened butter and vinegar to taste.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  4. Mustard + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,120 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Cooked chicken
Forms the bulk of the salad and provides its main protein texture.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add creamy richness and soft body that blends into the dressing.
Unsalted butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the dressing coat the chicken and egg.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavor that balances the richness of butter and eggs.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and cuts through the fat.

The step that matters

Stir the dressing into the chicken and egg mixture until evenly coated. Softened butter must be mixed in evenly so the dressing coats every piece; unevenly distributed fat leaves dry patches and greasy spots, and the salad can look dry or wet in places.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, egg, butter, sugar, pepper, sauce, vinegar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Asparagusfits less well
  4. Shallotfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, egg, butter, sugar, pepper, sauce, vinegar. 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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