Name: Horse Radish for Winter
Ingredients: 1 cup grated horse radish; 2 tablespoons white sugar; ½ teaspoon salt; 1½ pints cold vinegar; 2 tablespoons horse radish mixture; 2 teaspoons olive oil (or melted butter or cream); 1 teaspoon prepared mustard

Why it works: Radish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 297 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Horse Radish for Winter

Ingredients

1 cup grated horse radish
2 tablespoons white sugar
½ teaspoon salt
1½ pints cold vinegar
2 tablespoons horse radish mixture
2 teaspoons olive oil (or melted butter or cream)
1 teaspoon prepared mustard

Directions

Make the base

Mix 1 cup grated horse radish, 2 tablespoons white sugar, ½ teaspoon salt, and 1½ pints cold vinegar.
Bottle and seal the mixture.

Finish the sauce

Take 2 tablespoons of the horse radish mixture and add 2 teaspoons olive oil (or melted butter or cream) and 1 teaspoon prepared mustard.
Mix well 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.

Radish + mustardtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together297 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Horse + radishtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together529 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).
Horse + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together201 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).
Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Olive + mustardtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,950 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

Grated horseradish: Supplies the sharp, pungent heat that defines the sauce.
Cold vinegar: Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps keep the sauce stable.
White sugar: Balances the sharpness of the vinegar and horseradish.
Olive oil, melted butter or cream: Adds fat that softens the heat and gives a smoother, rounder mouthfeel.
Prepared mustard: Adds a sharp, tangy note that complements the horseradish.

“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.