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Egg Salad

A salad of diced hard-boiled eggs and sweet pickles dressed with a vinaigrette of vinegar, water, sugar, salt, butter, cayenne, mustard, cornstarch, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and lettuce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,356 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Egg Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the hard-boiled eggs and sweet pickles into small dice.

Make the dressing

  1. In a saucepan, combine vinegar, water, sugar, salt, and butter.

  2. Boil the mixture for a few minutes.

  3. Pour the hot mixture over the beaten yolks of 2 eggs.

  4. Boil for a few minutes.

  5. Add cayenne pepper, mustard mixed in water, and cornstarch mixed in water.

  6. Boil for a few more minutes.

  7. Remove from heat.

  8. Pour the dressing into the beaten whites of 2 eggs.

  9. Let it cool.

Assemble and serve

  1. Pour the dressing over the diced eggs and pickles.

  2. Add whipped cream to taste.

  3. Garnish with finely cut lettuce 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. Mustard + lettucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + lettucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,037 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

Eggs
Egg yolks thicken the hot dressing into a creamy custard-like base.
Vinegar
Adds the sharp acidity that balances the sugar and rich eggs.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that offsets the acidity of the vinegar.
Cornstarch
Thickens the dressing so it clings to the diced eggs and pickles.
Whipped cream
Adds fat and lightness, softening the dressing's texture.
Sweet pickles
Contribute sweetness and crunch to the diced salad.

The step that matters

Pouring the hot mixture over the beaten yolks. If the hot liquid is poured in too quickly, or the yolks are not beaten smooth, the eggs can scramble instead of thickening the dressing evenly. Adding the hot mixture gradually while whisking gently tempers the yolks.

Flavor stand-ins for the lettuce

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

  1. Horseradishbetter flavor fit
  2. Capsicumabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Shallotabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, vinegar, sugar, butter, pepper, mustard, cream. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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