Name: Celery Salad with Red Peppers and Cheese
Ingredients: 2 cups celery, cut into 2-inch pieces; 2 tablespoons red peppers, cut into small pieces; mayonnaise; grated cheese

Why it works: Celery and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16,012 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery Salad with Red Peppers and Cheese

Ingredients

2 cups celery, cut into 2-inch pieces
2 tablespoons red peppers, cut into small pieces
mayonnaise
grated cheese

Directions

Prepare the celery

Curl the celery by making five lengthwise cuts in each stalk, cutting one-third of the way down.
Make six cuts at right angles to the first cuts.
Soak the celery in ice water overnight if possible.
Drain and dry thoroughly.

Assemble the salad

For every cup of celery, mix in 2 tablespoons of red peppers.
Dress the mixture with mayonnaise.
Sprinkle with a small amount of grated cheese.
Add more mayonnaise on top.

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.

Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + cheesetop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,861 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Celery + cheesetop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together647 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

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

What each ingredient does

Celery: Forms the crisp, crunchy base of the salad and curls when soaked in ice water.
Red peppers: Add sweetness and a bit of crunch and color to the salad.
Mayonnaise: Adds fat and moisture, binding the salad and coating the vegetables.
Grated cheese: Adds savory flavor and richness to the dressing.

The step that matters

Drying the celery thoroughly. Any water left on the celery will thin the mayonnaise and make the salad watery. Thorough drying after the ice-water soak keeps the dressing thick and clinging to the pieces.

Swap the celery

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

Thymefits better
Parsleyfits about as well
Basilfits about as well
Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, cheese. 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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Celery Salad with Red Peppers and Cheese