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Salad

Dill Pickles

Cucumbers are pickled with dill, grape leaves, water, and salt in a brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and dill match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 530 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Dill Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Make a brine strong enough to float an egg, then add ½ as much more water.

  2. Wash and wipe the cucumbers.

Pack and cover

  1. Place cucumbers in a jar, separating each layer with grape leaves and dill.

  2. Pour the brine over the cucumbers.

  3. Cover with a cloth and place an inverted plate on top.

  4. Wash the cloth frequently.

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. Cucumber + dilltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together530 recipes

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

  2. Cucumber + grapetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together380 recipes

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

  3. Grape + dilltop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together110 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

Cucumbers
Form the crisp, watery body of the pickle as they ferment.
Dill
Adds its characteristic aroma to the cucumbers and brine.
Grape leaves
Their tannins help keep the cucumbers firm and crisp.
Salt
Seasons the brine and helps control spoilage microbes while the cucumbers ferment.

The step that matters

Make the brine strong enough to float an egg. The salt concentration must be high enough to control spoilage microbes during fermentation. A weak brine lets unwanted microbes grow, which can soften or spoil the cucumbers.

Swap the grape

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, dill):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Grapethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, dill. 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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