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Cherry Pickles

Pickled cucumbers with cherry leaves, brined, then simmered with vinegar, water, cinnamon, onions, and optional celery and mustard seeds, finished in sugar syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Cherry Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Brine

  1. Wash the cucumbers and layer them in a stone jar with washed cherry leaves.

  2. Press down the layers and pour over a brine made of 1 cup salt and 6 cups water.

  3. Weight down with a plate and stone to keep pickles submerged for about a week.

Recrisp and pack

  1. After a week, remove from brine, wash thoroughly, and wipe dry.

  2. Cut off the tough stem ends and place in a kettle, covering with equal parts vinegar and water.

  3. Heat gently for 4 to 5 hours without boiling.

  4. Drain and pack in glass jars with a stick of cinnamon and a few small onions in each jar.

  5. Add celery seed and white mustard seed if desired, then pour over a syrup made of 3 lbs sugar and 1 gallon of water.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  3. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  4. Cucumber + cherrytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together331 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Cherry + cinnamontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together551 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Form the pickle itself; their firm flesh is what the brine and syrup transform.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the cucumbers and seasons them during the week-long brine.
Sugar
Sweetens the syrup and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the pickles and helps preserve them.
Cherry leaves
Add a subtle aroma and help keep the cucumbers firm during brining.

The step that matters

Heat gently without boiling. Boiling the cucumbers in the vinegar and water mixture would soften their flesh and make them mushy. Holding them just below a boil for 4 to 5 hours lets the pickles take up flavor while keeping their texture.

Swap the celery

The recipe marks celery as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, cherry, vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, onion, mustard):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, cherry, vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, onion, mustard. 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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