Skip to main content
Main

Pickled Green Peppers

Pickled green bell peppers stuffed with cabbage and mustard, preserved in brine and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cabbage and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,645 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pickled Green Peppers

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peppers

  1. Cut a slit in the side of each pepper to extract the seeds, keeping them whole.

  2. Make a strong brine and pour it over the peppers.

  3. Let the peppers stand for 24 hours.

  4. Remove the peppers from the brine.

  5. Soak the peppers in water for 1 day and 1 night.

  6. Drain the water.

Pickle in vinegar

  1. Scald vinegar with a small piece of alum.

  2. Pour the scalded vinegar over the peppers.

  3. Let the peppers stand for 3 days.

Stuff and jar

  1. Prepare a stuffing by mixing the chopped cabbage with a little salt and the mustard seed.

  2. Stuff the peppers tightly with the mixture.

  3. Stitch the peppers up.

  4. Place the stuffed peppers in a stone jar.

  5. Pour scalding hot spiced vinegar over the peppers and cover the jar tightly.

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

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

  2. Pepper + cabbagetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + cabbagetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 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 bell peppers
Their flesh becomes tender and crisp-firm after brining and soaking, holding the stuffing.
White cabbage
Fills the peppers and, once pickled, adds crunch and a sharp, tangy bulk.
White mustard seed
Adds a pungent, sharp flavour to the cabbage stuffing as it pickles.
Vinegar
Acidity preserves the peppers and gives the pickle its sour, tangy character.

The step that matters

Stuffing the peppers tightly. Packing the cabbage firmly leaves little air around the filling, which helps keep the peppers submerged and reduces spoilage risk in the jar. Loose stuffing can let peppers float or collapse.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, vinegar, mustard):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Radishfits about as well
  3. Lettucefits about as well
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, vinegar, mustard. 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.

You might also like

Red CabbageRed Cabbage65 recipesStewed CabbageStewed Cabbage58 recipesBaked CabbageBaked Cabbage51 recipesCabbage DressingCabbage Dressing19 recipes