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French Pickles

A pickled green tomato and onion relish seasoned with salt, vinegar, sugar, mustard, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

French Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Mix sliced green tomatoes and onions in a bowl, then sprinkle with salt and let stand overnight.

  2. Drain thoroughly the next day.

  3. Boil in 1 quart vinegar and 2 quarts water for 15-20 minutes.

Make the pickling syrup

  1. In a large pot, combine 4 quarts vinegar, brown sugar, mustard seed, allspice, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and ground mustard, then boil the mixture for 15 minutes.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Allspice + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mustard + allspicetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 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 pickle and absorb the spiced vinegar as they cook.
Onions
Add savory depth and a little sweetness as they soften in the brine.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the tomatoes and onions, firming them and reducing sogginess.
Vinegar
Supplies the sharp acidity that preserves the pickles and balances the sugar.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a molasses note that rounds the sharpness of the vinegar.
White mustard seed
Contributes a pungent, slightly bitter flavour that deepens during simmering.

The step that matters

Drain thoroughly the next day. Salt draws out water overnight, but any liquid left behind dilutes the spiced vinegar and makes the pickles soft and watery in the jar.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Cucumberfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, vinegar, sugar, mustard, allspice, cinnamon, clove. 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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