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Pickled Walnuts

Pickled walnuts preserved in brine and vinegar with spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Walnut and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 22% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,769 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Pickled Walnuts

Ingredients

Directions

Brine

  1. Take green walnuts and make a brine that will float an egg.

  2. Submerge the walnuts.

  3. Keep them weighted for a week.

  4. Make another brine.

  5. Keep the walnuts in it for another week.

Prepare

  1. Remove the walnuts.

  2. Wash them.

  3. Wipe with a coarse cloth.

  4. Soak in fresh water for two days.

Pickle

  1. Boil the walnuts in weak vinegar for a week.

  2. Boil enough strong vinegar to cover the walnuts.

  3. Add ½ cup of spices per gallon.

  4. Place the walnuts in a jar.

  5. Pour the hot vinegar over them.

  6. Weight down.

  7. Cover tightly.

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. Walnut + vinegartop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Walnut + eggtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + vinegartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and vinegar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,922 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Green walnuts
Provide the tender unripe fruit that is pickled and turns dark during the brining.
Brine
Salt draws out moisture and bitterness, firming the walnuts before pickling.
Weak vinegar
Begins the acidic pickling and helps preserve the walnuts before the strong vinegar is added.
Strong vinegar
Acidity covers the walnuts in the jar, preserving them and giving the pickle its sharp flavour.
Spices
Add aroma and flavour that infuse into the vinegar and the walnuts.

The step that matters

Keeping the walnuts fully weighted and covered in brine. Walnuts that float or are exposed to air can spoil or discolour, because the salt and vinegar only preserve and protect the fruit when fully submerged.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Sesamefits better
  2. Peasfits about as well
  3. Soybeanfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, 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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