Skip to main content
Salad

Cold Cucumber Pickle

A pickled cucumber dish preserved in vinegar, salt, mustard seed, and black pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cucumber and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,281 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cold Cucumber Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Pare and slice the cucumbers.

  2. Skin and slice the onions.

  3. Sprinkle the salt over the cucumbers and onions.

  4. Place in a colander and drain for 12 hours.

Pickle and rest

  1. Mix the mustard seed and black pepper with the cucumbers and onions.

  2. Cover with vinegar.

  3. Seal in an airtight container.

  4. Let sit for 3 days before serving.

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. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cucumber + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,050 recipes

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

  5. Cucumber + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,734 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Provide the main bulk and crisp texture of the pickle.
White onions
Add savory sharpness and aroma that complements the cucumbers.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the vegetables, firming them and helping them keep their crispness.
White mustard seed
Adds pungent, sharp flavor and a mild bite to the brine.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the vegetables and gives the pickle its tang.

The step that matters

Drain the salted vegetables for 12 hours. Salt pulls moisture out of the cucumbers and onions. Draining fully removes that water so the pickle stays crisp and the vinegar is not diluted.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, mustard, pepper, 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.

You might also like

Chicken SaladChicken Salad623 recipesSalad DressingSalad Dressing491 recipesTomato SaladTomato Salad179 recipesCold SlawCold Slaw160 recipes