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Ragout Pickle

A pickle made with green tomatoes, cabbage, onions, spices, salt, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Ragout Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine all ingredients in a large pot.

  2. Boil for 1 hour or until the mixture is clear.

  3. Allow to cool before transferring to jars.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 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 + allspicetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

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

  5. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the pickle and their tartness balances the sweetness.
Cabbage
Adds crisp texture and body that softens during simmering.
Vinegar
Acidity that preserves the pickle and sharpens the flavour.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that offsets the vinegar's sharpness and helps build a rich flavour.
Mustard seed
Contributes pungent, slightly bitter flavour that deepens as it cooks.

The step that matters

Boil for 1 hour or until the mixture is clear. A full boil softens the vegetables and drives off raw vinegar sharpness while the sugar and spices meld. Stopping early can leave the pickle harsh and the vegetables firm.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, onion, mustard, celery, allspice, clove, pepper):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, onion, mustard, celery, allspice, clove, 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.

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