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Onion Pickle

A pickled condiment made from small white onions, ground mustard, oil, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Onion Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the onions

  1. Peel the onions.

  2. For nine consecutive mornings, scald the onions in fresh salt water, pouring off the old water each time.

  3. On the 10th day, drain the onions and pack them in jars.

Make and add the dressing

  1. In a pot, combine the ground mustard, oil, sugar, and enough vinegar to cover the onions. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  2. Pour the dressing over the onions in the jars, ensuring they are not too full to allow for dressing.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Mustard + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,424 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

Small white onions
Form the main body of the pickle, becoming crisp-tender as they are repeatedly scalded and then pickled.
Ground mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that carries through the vinegar dressing.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the onions and gives the pickle its tang.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
Oil
Adds fat and a smoother, rounder mouthfeel to the dressing.

The step that matters

Scalding the onions over nine mornings. Repeated scalding in fresh salt water draws out moisture and sharpness from the onions gradually. Skipping days or changing the water inconsistently can leave the onions harsh or soggy in the finished pickle.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mustard, sugar, 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.

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