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Chow-Chow

A pickled relish of green tomatoes, cabbage, onions, peppers, cucumber, horseradish, mustard, spices, and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Horseradish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,832 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Chow-Chow

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Salt the chopped green tomatoes, cabbage, onions, and green peppers, and let them stand overnight.

  2. Drain the mixture in a basket overnight.

  3. Place the mixture in a large porcelain kettle and cover with equal parts vinegar and water.

  4. Let it sit for two days.

  5. Drain again in a basket overnight.

Cook and finish

  1. Add the cucumber pickle, horseradish, mustard seed, celery seed, ground black pepper, cinnamon, turmeric, and brown sugar.

  2. Cover with vinegar and boil for 20 minutes.

  3. While hot, stir in the mustard.

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. Horseradish + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cucumber + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together640 recipes

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

  3. Cabbage + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together481 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

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

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

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 relish and release moisture that salting draws out.
Cabbage
Adds crisp body that holds its texture through the long pickling process.
Onions
Contribute sharp aromatic flavor that mellows during the long soak and cooking.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the relish and gives it its tang.
Mustard seed
Adds pungent heat and sharpness that develops during cooking in the vinegar.

The step that matters

Draining after salting. Salt draws water out of the vegetables by osmosis. Draining thoroughly removes that liquid so the relish stays crisp and does not become watery or diluted in the vinegar.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Radishfits better
  2. Broccolifits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, onion, pepper, vinegar, cucumber, horseradish, 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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