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Sweet Pickles

A pickled mixture of cabbage, green peppers, onions, and green tomatoes flavored with black pepper, allspice, mustard seed, celery seed, salt, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and celery 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 ↓

Sweet Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the cabbage, green peppers, onions, and green tomatoes.

Cook

  1. Combine all chopped vegetables with black pepper, allspice, mustard seed, celery seed, salt, and sugar in a large pot.

  2. Cover the mixture with vinegar.

  3. Boil for 2 hours, stirring occasionally.

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. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Allspice + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk and tartness that pickles down into the relish.
Cabbage
Adds crisp texture and body that holds up through long simmering.
White mustard seed
Contributes sharp, pungent flavor that mellows during the long boil.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and aroma as they soften in the vinegar.
Vinegar
Acidity preserves the vegetables and gives the pickle its sharp tang.

The step that matters

Boil for 2 hours, stirring occasionally. Long simmering softens the vegetables and mellows the sharp vinegar and mustard flavors. Stirring prevents the mixture from scorching on the bottom of the pot, since its high sugar and vegetable content can burn easily.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, pepper, onion, allspice, mustard, celery, sugar):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Broccolifits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, pepper, onion, allspice, mustard, celery, sugar. 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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