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Preserve

To Pickle Walnuts Black

Young walnuts brined, blackened in air, then pickled in boiled spiced vinegar and sealed in jars.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Leslie · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

To Pickle Walnuts Black

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the walnuts

  1. Gather the walnuts while young and soft, when the sun is upon them, so that a pin can be run through them easily.

  2. Rub the walnuts with a coarse flannel or tow cloth to get off the fur of the outside.

  3. Mix salt and water strong enough to bear an egg.

  4. Let the walnuts lie in the salt water a week, changing it every two days and stirring them frequently.

  5. Take the walnuts out and drain them.

  6. Spread the walnuts on large dishes and expose them to the air about ten minutes.

  7. Scald the walnuts in boiling water, without letting them lie in it.

  8. Rub the walnuts with a coarse woollen cloth.

  9. Pierce every walnut through in several places with a large needle.

Make the pickle

  1. Put the walnuts into stone jars and prepare the spice and vinegar.

  2. Boil the spice in the vinegar for fifteen minutes.

  3. Strain the vinegar and pour it boiling hot over the walnuts.

  4. Tie a tea-cupful of mustard seed and a large table-spoonful of scraped horse-radish in a thin muslin rag and put it into the jars with the walnuts.

  5. Cover the jars closely with corks and leathers.

Alternative method

  1. Alternatively, after preparing the walnuts as above, put them into jars with the pounded spices strewn among them, then pour over them strong cold vinegar.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

59Calories
1 gProtein
4 gFat
6 gCarbs

Counts 7 of 8 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 7 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Walnut1 walnut half (4g)26
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Allspice1 tsp ground (1.9g)5
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macenot in our table0

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

By Eliza Leslie. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Allspice + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Nutmeg + walnuttop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,230 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

Walnuts
The fruit being pickled, which softens and darkens as it steeps in the spiced vinegar.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the walnuts and carries the spice flavour.
Cloves
Adds a warm, aromatic spice flavour to the pickling liquid.
Allspice
Adds a warm, aromatic flavour that rounds out the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Piercing every walnut. Piercing each walnut in several places lets the vinegar and spices penetrate the flesh. Without these openings the liquid mostly stays on the surface, so the pickle flavours unevenly and keeps less well.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, clove, allspice, pepper, nutmeg, walnut. 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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