Name: Sweet Pickled Cabbage
Ingredients: 2 small cabbages, shaved thin or chopped fine; 1 teaspoon powdered cloves; 1 teaspoon powdered cinnamon; 1 teaspoon powdered allspice; 2 cups vinegar; 2 teaspoons salt; 1 cup dark sugar; a pinch of red pepper

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 ↓

Sweet Pickled Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Shave or chop the cabbages finely.

Cook

In a pot, combine the cabbages with cloves, cinnamon, allspice, vinegar, salt, dark sugar, and red pepper.
Scald the mixture thoroughly, stirring constantly until the cabbage is cooked and tender.

Store and rest

Let it cool, then store in a jar and refrigerate.
Allow to sit for at least a week before eating.

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.

Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,189 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together7,874 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,536 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together17,451 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,395 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage: Forms the bulk of the pickle and becomes tender as it cooks in the vinegar mixture.
Vinegar: Provides the acidity that preserves the cabbage and gives the pickle its sharp flavour.
Dark sugar: Adds sweetness and molasses depth that balances the sharp vinegar.
Cloves: Contributes warm, aromatic spice flavour to the pickle.
Cinnamon: Adds warm, sweet spice aroma that rounds out the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Scald until the cabbage is tender. Cabbage softens and absorbs the spiced vinegar only when cooked long enough; stirring constantly keeps the sugar and spices from scorching on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the cabbage

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

Mustardfits better
Capsicumfits better
Horseradishfits better
Cabbagethe original

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

Red Cabbage65 recipes

Stewed Cabbage58 recipes

Baked Cabbage51 recipes

Cabbage Dressing19 recipes

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Sweet Pickled Cabbage