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Dessert

To Pickle Grapes

A method for pickling grapes using a brine of water, salt, sugar, spices, and vinegar, then storing in jars.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

To Pickle Grapes

Ingredients

Directions

Brine the grapes

  1. Boil water and coarse sea salt for 30 minutes, skimming well.

  2. Pour the liquid over the grapes.

  3. Cover the grapes with vine leaves.

  4. Let sit for 2 days on the hearth.

  5. Drain the grapes on a cloth.

  6. Cover the grapes with flannel until dry.

Make the pickle and pack

  1. Layer grapes in stone jars with fresh vine leaves in between.

  2. Boil hard water and loaf sugar for 15 minutes, skimming well.

  3. Add mace, nutmeg, and white wine vinegar.

  4. Boil the mixture together.

  5. Once cold, pour the mixture over the grapes.

  6. Cover the grapes well.

  7. Seal with a bladder and leather.

  8. Store in a dry place.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,776 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  4. Mace + white winetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,329 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  5. Nutmeg + white winetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,659 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

What each ingredient does

Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the grapes and seasons them during the initial brine.
Loaf sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
White wine vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the grapes and gives the pickle its tang.
Grapes (in the method)
Main ingredient; the salt and vinegar steps firm and preserve their flesh.

The step that matters

Skimming the boiled liquids. Skimming removes foam and impurities that would otherwise cloud the brine and can spoil the preserve. Boiling the sugar and salt fully dissolves them so the liquid is evenly concentrated.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Clovefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, nutmeg, white wine, vinegar. 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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