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Watermel and Muskmelon Pickle

A pickled preserve made from watermelon or muskmelon, sweetened with sugar and spiced with cloves, cinnamon, and allspice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Watermel and Muskmelon Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Place the cut fruit in a stone jar and pour enough scalding vinegar over it to cover.

  2. Heat the vinegar for three consecutive days, pouring it over the fruit each time.

  3. Weigh the fruit.

Make the syrup

  1. For every 5 pounds of fruit, add 3 pounds of sugar and 1 quart of vinegar.

  2. Add cloves, cinnamon, and allspice to taste.

  3. Boil the mixture until the fruit is tender.

  4. Boil down the syrup until there is just enough to cover the fruit.

Pack and serve

  1. Transfer the mixture to jars.

  2. Pour the syrup over the scalding hot fruit.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Vinegar + allspicetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Watermelon or muskmelon
Forms the bulk of the pickle and absorbs the syrup's flavour as it softens.
White sugar
Sweetens the pickle and, when boiled down, thickens the syrup that coats the fruit.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps preserve the fruit.
Cloves
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavour to the syrup.
Cinnamon
Adds warm, sweet spice aroma to the syrup.
Allspice
Adds a blended warm aroma to the syrup.

The step that matters

Boil down the syrup until there is just enough to cover the fruit. Reducing the syrup concentrates the sugar and vinegar, which helps preserve the fruit and thickens the coating. Too little reduction leaves a thin, watery pickle; over-reducing can make it overly sweet and sticky.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, allspice):

  1. Clovethe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Cardamomfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, allspice. 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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