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Pickled Cauliflowers

A preserved cauliflower pickled in spiced vinegar after brining.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cauliflower and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 687 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Pickled Cauliflowers

Ingredients

Directions

Salt the cauliflower

  1. Pull apart the cauliflower into bunches and spread them on an earthen dish.

  2. Sprinkle coarse sea salt over the cauliflower and let it stand for three days.

  3. After three days, place the cauliflower into earthen jars and pour boiling salt water over them.

  4. Let them stand overnight, then drain and transfer to glass jars.

Pickle in spiced vinegar

  1. Fill the jars with white vinegar prepared as for onions.

  2. To prepare the spiced vinegar, boil together 1 gallon of vinegar, 1 cup of sugar, mace, celery seed, white peppercorns, red pepper pods, coriander seed, and white mustard for five minutes.

  3. Pour the hot spiced vinegar over the cauliflower in the jars.

  4. Scald the jars once a week for three weeks, placing a small plate on top to keep the cauliflower submerged.

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. Cauliflower + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + coriandertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,949 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Cauliflower + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together488 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

Cauliflower
Forms the main bulk; salting and brining soften its texture while it stays crisp-tender.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the cauliflower and seasons it before the brine and vinegar are added.
White vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that preserves the cauliflower and gives the pickle its tang.
White sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.

The step that matters

Keep the cauliflower submerged in the vinegar. Pieces left above the liquid can spoil and grow mold, because the acidic vinegar only protects what it fully covers. The small plate holds the cauliflower under the liquid.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cauliflower, vinegar, sugar, celery, pepper, coriander, mustard. 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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