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Eggs Pickled

Hard-boiled eggs preserved in vinegar with mace, cloves, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Eggs Pickled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs

  1. Boil 12 or more eggs hard.

  2. Place the boiled eggs in cold water.

  3. Peel off the shells and place the whole eggs in a stone jar.

  4. Add mace, cloves, and nutmeg to the jar.

Pickle

  1. Pour boiling vinegar over the eggs until they are covered.

  2. Seal the jar tightly.

  3. After three days, scald the vinegar again.

  4. Pour the scalded vinegar over the eggs.

  5. Cork the jar tightly.

  6. Let it sit for two weeks before using.

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. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Clove + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + nutmegtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and nutmeg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 24,744 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Provide the main body of the pickle, absorbing flavour from the vinegar and spices.
Boiling vinegar
Acidity that preserves the eggs and gives the pickled sharpness.
Mace
Adds warm, aromatic flavour to the pickling liquid.
Cloves
Adds warm, aromatic flavour to the pickling liquid.
Nutmeg
Adds warm, aromatic flavour to the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Scalding the vinegar again after three days. Reheating the vinegar helps the spices release their flavour and keeps the pickle stable. Leaving the jar unsealed or skipping the reheat can let spoilage start, so the jar should stay tightly closed between steps.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, clove, nutmeg, vinegar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, clove, nutmeg, 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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