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Ripe Tomato Pickle

A pickle made from ripe tomatoes, sugar, vinegar, and spices boiled for two hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Ripe Tomato Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Take good ripe tomatoes, peel and cut them into chunks.

  2. For every 5 pounds of tomatoes, add 2 pounds sugar, 1 pint vinegar, and 1 teaspoonful of all kinds of spices.

  3. Boil for 2 hours.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

74Calories
1 gProtein
0 gFat
18 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Tomato1 medium (123g)22
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Johnson, Vt. Congregational church. [from old catalog]. 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. See the original page.

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

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

  2. Tomato + vinegartop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,063 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + sugartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,667 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Form the bulk of the pickle and supply moisture and body as they cook down.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the pickle while it cooks.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and helps preserve the pickle.
Spices
Add aroma and flavor to the tomatoes.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Cucumberfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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