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Bean Pickles

Pickled butter beans prepared with vinegar, sugar, flour, mustard, turmeric, and celery seed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and celery 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 ↓

Bean Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beans

  1. Boil the butter beans in salted water for 30 minutes. Drain the beans.

Make the pickling liquid

  1. In a pot, combine vinegar and brown sugar; bring to a boil.

  2. In a bowl, mix flour, mustard, turmeric, and celery seed with cold water.

  3. Add the mixture to the boiling vinegar and sugar. Stir well and pour over the drained beans.

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. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Mustard + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Beans + mustardtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together852 recipes

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

  4. Turmeric + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,356 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Beans + turmerictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together419 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Butter beans
Form the bulk of the dish and provide the firm, tender texture.
Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that gives the pickle its tang and helps preserve it.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and depth that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Flour
Starch thickens the boiling liquid so it clings to the beans.
Mustard
Contributes pungent, sharp flavor that complements the sweet and sour base.
Turmeric
Gives the pickling liquid its yellow colour.

The step that matters

Adding the flour mixture to the boiling vinegar and sugar. Flour mixed into cold water first disperses evenly, so when it meets the hot liquid its starch thickens smoothly instead of forming lumps. Stirring well keeps the thickening even.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, beans, vinegar, sugar, flour, mustard, turmeric):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Cuminfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, beans, vinegar, sugar, flour, mustard, turmeric. 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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