Why it works: Cucumber and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,281 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Pickled Cucumbers
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the brine
Wash cucumbers carefully and place them in jars.
Make a weak brine with a handful of coarse sea salt in 1½ gallons of water.
When the brine is scalding hot, pour it over the cucumbers and cover them; repeat this for three mornings, skimming thoroughly each time.
Make the alum vinegar
On the fourth day, heat vinegar in a porcelain kettle and add a walnut-sized piece of alum.
When the vinegar is scalding hot, add cucumbers until covered; do not let them boil, skim off as soon as scalded, and replace with more cucumbers, adding a small piece of alum each time.
After this process, discard the vinegar and replace it with good cider or white wine vinegar; add spices, mustard seed, and red peppers.
Pack and store
Sort the pickles and place them in stone or glass jars, then pour the hot spiced vinegar over them, seal, and store jars not needed for immediate use.
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.
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Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,281 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Cucumber + walnuttop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together380 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together14,067 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Cucumber + vinegartop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,734 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).
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Walnut + mustardtop 9% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together849 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cucumbers
- The main vegetable that is transformed into pickles through brining and vinegar treatment.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws water out of the cucumbers and seasons them during the brining stage.
- Vinegar (cider or white wine)
- Provides acidity that preserves the cucumbers and gives the pickles their sharp flavor.
- Alum
- Helps the cucumbers stay firm and crisp during the hot vinegar treatment.
- Mustard seed
- Adds a pungent, aromatic flavor to the spiced vinegar.
The step that matters
Keep the vinegar below a boil when adding cucumbers. Boiling softens cucumber flesh and drives off flavor, so the vinegar should only be scalding hot and the cucumbers skimmed out as soon as they heat through.
Swap the walnut
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, vinegar, mustard, pepper):
- Lentilsfits better
- Black-eyed peafits better
- Sesamefits better
- Walnutthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, vinegar, mustard, 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.
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