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Pickled Green Peppers

A preserved dish of green bell peppers stuffed with cabbage, mustard, and preserved in a brine and vinegar solution.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 in the brine for 24 hours.

  4. Remove the peppers from the brine and soak them in water.

  5. Let the peppers soak in water for 24 hours.

  6. Drain the water.

Pickle in vinegar

  1. Scald some 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 coarse sea 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 hot spiced vinegar over the peppers.

  6. 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 firm flesh becomes tender-crisp during brining and holds the stuffing while pickling.
White cabbage
Supplies the bulk of the stuffing, adding crunch and body that fills the peppers.
White mustard seed
Adds a sharp, pungent flavour to the stuffing and the pickling vinegar.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the peppers and gives the pickle its sour taste.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the peppers and cabbage and seasons the brine and stuffing.

The step that matters

Strong brine soak. Salt draws water out of the peppers through osmosis, firming them and reducing the water that could dilute the vinegar. Too weak a brine or a short soak can leave the peppers soft and prone to spoiling.

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.

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