Skip to main content
Main

Pickled Radish Pods

Pickled radish pods preserved in a brine and vinegar mixture with mace, ginger, and red peppers.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Horse and radish work together. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 529 recipes. Both carry 2-methylbutyraldehyde, which smells malty, chocolate. The science ↓

Pickled Radish Pods

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pods

  1. Pick 2 quarts of tender, green horse-radish pods with seeds just forming.

  2. Soak the pods in brine overnight.

  3. Transfer the pods and brine to a porcelain kettle and heat to steaming.

  4. Drain the pods and return them to the jar.

  5. If they are not tender, bring the brine to a boil and pour it over the pods again. Repeat until the pods are tender.

Make the pickling liquor

  1. In a porcelain kettle, combine 1 quart of cider vinegar, 2 blades of mace, sliced ginger, red peppers, and chopped horse-radish; bring to a boil.

  2. Pour the hot mixture over the pods and let sit overnight.

  3. Drain the vinegar, bring it to a boil again, and pour it over the pods.

Store

  1. Once cooled, store the pods in a cool, dry place.

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. Horse + radishtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together529 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  2. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Radish + gingertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together172 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Radish + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together508 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Ginger + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 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

Horse-radish pods
Form the main body of the pickle, becoming tender through repeated hot brining.
Cider vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the pods and gives the pickle its sharp flavor.
Brine
Salt solution that softens the pods and draws out some of their pungency before pickling.
Red peppers
Add mild sweetness and color to the pickling liquor.

The step that matters

Repeat the hot brine until the pods are tender. Pods that are not fully softened stay tough and fibrous. Reheating the brine and pouring it over them again softens the tissue gradually, so testing for tenderness before moving on matters.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (horse, radish, cider, vinegar, ginger, pepper):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against horse, radish, cider, vinegar, ginger, pepper. 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.

You might also like

Horseradish SauceHorseradish Sauce23 recipesHorseradish ButterHorseradish Butter6 recipesHam in CiderHam in Cider10 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipes