Name: Lobster Salad
Ingredients: 1 can lobster, chopped finely; 2 cups lettuce, chopped finely; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 1 teaspoon mustard

Why it works: Lettuce and mustard 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 ↓

Lobster Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Chop the lobster finely.
Chop the lettuce finely, using twice as much as the lobster.

Assemble and season

Mix the lobster and lettuce together.
Season with pepper, coarse sea salt, and mustard.

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.

Lettuce + mustardtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,356 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Lettuce + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,037 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Lobster + mustardtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together394 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Lobster + lettucetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together411 recipes

Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

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

What each ingredient does

Lobster: Provides the main protein and the salad's substance.
Lettuce: Adds crisp texture and bulk, with moisture from its leaves.
Mustard: Adds sharp, tangy flavour that cuts through the richness of the lobster.