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Lemon Mangoes

Pickled lemons preserved in brine with mustard seed, horseradish, ginger, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and horseradish 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 ↓

Lemon Mangoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lemons

  1. Cut a round piece from the blossom end of each lemon, larger than a shilling. Scoop out the insides and rinse with cold water.

  2. Soak the lemons in brine made with 4 ounces of salt and 1 quart of water for 6 days, changing the brine after 3 days.

  3. Drain the lemons and fill them with equal parts mustard seed and horseradish, sliced ginger, and shallots or garlic if desired.

  4. Sew the cut pieces back on the lemons and place them in a stone jar.

Pickle and finish

  1. Prepare a pickle with the strained juice of the lemons, 1 quart of vinegar, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 tablespoon ginger, 1 tablespoon white peppercorns, and 1-2 blades of mace.

  2. Pour the boiling pickle over the lemons.

  3. For quick consumption, place the jar in a cool oven overnight; otherwise, let it stand for 5-6 months.

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. Mustard + horseradishtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Mustard + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together859 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Horseradish + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together376 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Lemon + gingertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Lemon + shallottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lemons
Their rinds and juice supply the sour flavour and soften as the lemons cure in brine and pickle.
Salt
Draws water out of the lemons during the brine soak and helps preserve them.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that preserves the lemons and gives the pickle its sharp, tangy character.
Mustard seed
Contributes pungent flavour that infuses the lemons during the long pickling period.
Horseradish
Adds a sharp, pungent heat that mellows as the lemons pickle.

The step that matters

Changing the brine after 3 days. The salt brine draws out moisture and bitterness from the lemons; replacing it partway keeps the soak strong enough to cure the fruit evenly rather than letting the first brine weaken.

Swap the shallot

The recipe marks shallot as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, mustard, horseradish, ginger, vinegar, mace):

  1. Shallotthe original
  2. Radishfits about as well
  3. Broccolifits about as well
  4. Beetrootfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, mustard, horseradish, ginger, vinegar, mace. 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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