Why it works: Horseradish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,832 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
To Prepare Vinegar for Green or Yellow Pickle
Ingredients
Directions
Infuse the vinegar
Combine ginger, horseradish, mustard seed, long pepper, mace, and nutmeg in a pot.
Pour 2 gallons of strong vinegar over the ingredients.
Let it stand for 12 months, stirring very frequently.
Age and clarify
Store for a year.
Carefully pour the prepared vinegar from the ingredients to keep it clear.
Pour 2 gallons of prepared vinegar into a pot with some mace and nutmeg.
Add a little turmeric to restore color to green pickles.
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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Horseradish + mustardtop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,832 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,557 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
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Ginger + nutmegtop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together3,324 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together13,015 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together14,067 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Dried ginger
- Adds pungent, warm flavor that carries into the finished vinegar.
- Dried horseradish
- Contributes sharp, pungent flavor compounds that infuse into the vinegar.
- Dried mustard seed
- Adds sharp, pungent flavor and a little body to the infused vinegar.
- Strong vinegar
- Acts as the solvent that extracts flavor and gives the pickling liquid its acidity.
- Mace
- Adds warm, aromatic spice flavor to the vinegar.
- Nutmeg
- Adds warm, aromatic spice flavor to the vinegar.
The step that matters
Carefully pour the prepared vinegar off the ingredients. Pouring gently keeps sediment and solid spice particles behind, so the vinegar stays clear. Disturbing the settled material would cloud the liquid.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ginger, horseradish, mustard, pepper, nutmeg, vinegar):
- Allspicefits better
- Turmericfits better
- Cinnamonfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against ginger, horseradish, mustard, pepper, nutmeg, vinegar. 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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