Skip to main content
Main

Mangoes

A preserved mango dish pickled in vinegar with spices and optional sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mangoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mangoes

  1. Soak mangoes in brine for a few days.

  2. Rinse them in clear water and scald in weak vinegar.

  3. Let them stand in the vinegar for a week.

  4. Cut open one side and remove the seeds.

Fill and pickle

  1. Fill with chopped cabbage, mustard seed, celery seed, cloves, turmeric, black pepper, ground ginger, cinnamon, olive oil, and garlic.

  2. Tie them up and place in a stone jar.

  3. Pour enough cider vinegar over to cover the mangoes.

  4. Add sugar to the vinegar if a sweeter taste is desired.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  5. Clove + turmerictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,876 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Mustard seed
Adds sharp, pungent flavor that gives the pickle its characteristic bite.
Cabbage
Fills the cavity and adds crunch and bulk to the pickled mango.
Cider vinegar
Acidifies the liquid, preserving the mangoes and giving them their tang.
Sugar
Adds optional sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Olive oil
Adds fat and richness to the filling, carrying the spice aromas.

The step that matters

Scalding in weak vinegar. Scalding softens the fruit skin and helps it absorb the flavors and vinegar, so the pickle is evenly seasoned rather than tough or bland.

Swap the cabbage

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

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

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

You might also like

Cream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesRed CabbageRed Cabbage65 recipesStewed CabbageStewed Cabbage58 recipesBaked CabbageBaked Cabbage51 recipes