Name: Celery Salad
Ingredients: perfect stalks of celery; green and imperfect stalks of celery; 2 hard-boiled eggs, chopped fine; pepper to taste; coarse sea salt to taste; 1 cup vinegar; 1 tablespoon butter; 1 tablespoon prepared mustard; 1 tablespoon sugar

Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Celery Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Reserve the perfect stalks for garnish and cut the green and imperfect ones into small pieces.
In a bowl, combine the chopped celery and hard-boiled eggs, then season with pepper and salt.
In a saucepan, combine the beaten eggs, vinegar, and butter; cook until thickened.
Once cooled, mix in the mustard and sugar, then pour the dressing over the celery mixture.
Let the salad stand for 1 to 2 hours 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.

Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,169 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together16,012 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

Swap the celery

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

Tarragonfits better
Capersfits better
Cinnamonfits better
Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, vinegar, butter, mustard, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.