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Salad

Simple French Dressing

A vinaigrette dressing made with olive oil, vinegar, black pepper, and coarse sea salt for lettuce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Olive and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,297 recipes. Both carry isoamyl acetate, which smells banana, fruity. The science ↓

Simple French Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Dry the lettuce thoroughly using a salad basket and cloths.

  2. In a bowl, combine olive oil, vinegar, black pepper, and coarse sea salt.

Dress and serve

  1. Toss the dried lettuce with the oil first, then add the vinegar.

  2. Serve immediately.

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. Olive + vinegartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,297 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  2. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Olive oil
Supplies fat that carries flavor and coats the leaves, giving the dressing body.
Vinegar
Provides sharp acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness of the oil.

The step that matters

Toss the dried lettuce with the oil first, then add the vinegar. Oil coats the leaves before the acid is added, so the dressing clings rather than pooling. Dry leaves matter because water dilutes the dressing and stops it sticking.

“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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