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A pickled onion recipe using white onions, white wine vinegar, allspice, and black pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,395 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the onions

  1. Choose small white round onions in September.

  2. Remove the brown skin from the onions.

  3. Boil water in a tin stew-pan and add onions until they are covered.

  4. Remove the onions quickly with a slotted spoon.

  5. Place the onions on a clean cloth.

  6. Cover the onions with another cloth and repeat the process until all are done.

Pickle and store

  1. Let the onions cool, then place them in a jar or wide-mouthed bottle.

  2. Pour over the best white wine vinegar, heated but not boiling.

  3. Add 1 ounce of allspice and 1 ounce of whole black pepper for each gallon of vinegar.

  4. Cover the jar when the mixture is cold.

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. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Onion + white winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,535 recipes

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

  5. Onion + allspicetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,270 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Small white round onions
Main vegetable; they soften and turn mild and sweet as they pickle.
Best white wine vinegar
Acid that preserves the onions and gives them their sharp, tangy flavour.
Allspice
Adds warm, aromatic flavour to the pickling liquid.
Whole black pepper
Adds sharp, aromatic heat to the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Covering the onions with vinegar that is heated but not boiling. Boiling vinegar can soften the onions too much and drive off its aroma, while vinegar that is too cool may not pickle them as thoroughly. Keeping it just hot gives a firm, well-flavoured result.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (white wine, vinegar, allspice, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, vinegar, allspice, pepper. 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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