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Strawberry Pickles

A sweet pickled strawberry preserve made with vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove 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 ↓

Strawberry Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Pack and steep

  1. Layer fresh strawberries in a jar, sprinkling cinnamon and cloves between layers.

  2. In a saucepan, heat vinegar and sugar until boiling.

  3. Pour the hot syrup over the strawberries in the jar.

  4. Let the jar sit overnight.

Cook and finish

  1. Place the jar in a kettle of water and boil slowly for nearly 1 hour.

  2. Stir gently to avoid breaking the berries.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Vinegar + clovetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Vinegar + cinnamontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

Strawberries
Supply the fruit that softens and takes up the spiced, sweet-sour syrup.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that balances the sugar and gives the pickle its tang.
Sugar
Sweetens the syrup and balances the acidity of the vinegar.
Cinnamon
Adds warm aroma to the syrup and the fruit.
Cloves
Adds pungent, warm aroma to the syrup and the fruit.

The step that matters

Boil slowly and stir gently. Strawberries have delicate cell walls that break down quickly under rough heat or stirring. A slow simmer in the water bath softens the fruit evenly, while vigorous boiling or stirring turns the berries mushy and cloudy.

Swap the clove

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

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

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