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Corn Relish

A pickled corn relish with peppers, onions, celery, vinegar, sugar, flour, mustard, turmeric, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Corn Relish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the corn for 10 minutes.

  2. Chop the green peppers, onions, and celery using a food chopper.

Make the relish

  1. In a pot, combine 1 quart of vinegar, 2 cups of sugar, ½ cup of flour, 2 ounces of mustard, ½ teaspoon of turmeric powder, and ½ cup of coarse sea salt.

  2. Boil the mixture until it thickens.

  3. Mix in the chopped vegetables and boil for an additional 30 minutes.

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. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Thickens the vinegar mixture so the relish becomes thick rather than watery.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that gives the relish its tang and helps preserve it.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture until it thickens. Flour thickens only when the liquid reaches a full boil and is stirred, so under-boiling leaves the relish thin. Stirring prevents lumps and scorching on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (corn, pepper, celery, vinegar, sugar, flour, mustard):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against corn, pepper, celery, vinegar, sugar, flour, 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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