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To Pickle Walnuts

A preserved walnut dish preserved in brine and vinegar with spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Acton · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

To Pickle Walnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the walnuts

  1. Gather walnuts that can be pierced easily; when the shell can be felt, they are ready.

  2. Make sufficient brine to cover them well, with six ounces of salt to a quart of water. Take off the scum that rises as the salt dissolves.

  3. Throw in the walnuts and stir them night and morning. Change the brine every three days.

  4. If they are wanted for immediate eating, leave them in it for twelve days; otherwise, drain them from it in nine, spread them on dishes, and let them remain exposed to the air until they become black, which will be in twelve hours or less.

Make the pickle

  1. Make a pickle for them with something more than half a gallon of vinegar to the hundred, a teaspoonful of salt, two ounces of black pepper, three ounces of bruised ginger, a drachm of mace, and from a quarter to half an ounce of cloves (some may be stuck into three or four small onions), and four ounces of mustard-seed.

  2. Boil the whole of these together for about five minutes.

Pickle and store

  1. Have the walnuts ready in a stone jar or jars, and pour the hot pickle on them as it is taken from the fire.

  2. When the pickle is quite cold, cover the jar securely and store it in a dry place.

  3. Keep the walnuts always well covered with vinegar, and boil that which is added to them.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

60Calories
2 gProtein
0 gFat
13 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot 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 Acton. 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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Mustard + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mustard + clovetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,829 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Walnuts (in the method)
Are the pickled food; their shells must be soft enough to pierce and they darken when exposed to air.
Salt
Draws out moisture and flavour during the brining stage, firming and preparing the walnuts.
Vinegar
Acidifies the pickle, preserving the walnuts and giving them their sharp flavour.
Black pepper
Adds pungent heat and aroma to the pickle.
Mustard-seed
Adds sharp, pungent flavour to the pickle.
Cloves
Contribute warm, aromatic spice to the pickle.

The step that matters

Boil the walnuts with the pickle before it cools, then cover them fully with vinegar. Hot pickle poured over the walnuts helps drive out air and seal the jar, and keeping the walnuts submerged in acidic vinegar prevents spoilage at the surface. Boiling any vinegar added later keeps it sterile before it joins the jar.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mustard, vinegar, clove. 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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