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Chow-chow

A pickled vegetable relish made with cabbage, green tomato, cucumber, onion, horseradish, and spices, fermented for two days.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,620 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Chow-chow

Ingredients

Directions

Salt and rest

  1. In a pan or jar, layer the chopped cabbage, green tomato, cucumber, onion, and horseradish, sprinkling ground salt between layers.

  2. Press down compactly, cover, and let sit for two days.

Make the pickle

  1. On the second day, prepare the vinegar-pickle by boiling vinegar with ginger, allspice, mustard, and curry for 10 minutes.

  2. Grate and squeeze the lemon, adding the rind and juice to the vinegar mixture without a bag.

  3. Drain the vegetables and squeeze them in a cloth to remove excess brine.

  4. Add the drained vegetables to the boiling vinegar mixture and cook for 30 minutes.

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. Ginger + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cucumber + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together640 recipes

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

  3. Cabbage + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together481 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Tomato + cucumbertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

  5. Horseradish + allspicetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together654 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard white cabbage
Forms the bulk of the relish and provides a crisp, firm texture.
Green tomato
Adds acidity and body to the relish as it cooks down.
Cucumber
Contributes crisp texture and moisture to the chopped vegetable mix.
Ground salt
Draws water out of the vegetables, softening them and concentrating flavor during the resting step.
Vinegar
Acts as the preserving liquid, adding sharp acidity that keeps the relish tangy.
Horseradish
Adds pungent heat that mellows as the relish cooks.

The step that matters

Drain and squeeze the vegetables. Salting draws out a lot of liquid. If the vegetables are not well drained and squeezed, excess brine dilutes the vinegar and makes the relish watery and overly salty.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, cucumber, onion, horseradish, vinegar, ginger, allspice):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Radishfits better
  3. Broccolifits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, cucumber, onion, horseradish, vinegar, ginger, allspice. 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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