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Pickled Cucumbers

Pickled cucumbers preserved in a vinegar and spice brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon 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 ↓

Pickled Cucumbers

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the cucumbers in brine for 5 to 6 hours.

  2. In a pot, combine cider vinegar, sugar, cloves, cinnamon, black pepper, horseradish, and red peppers.

  3. Scald the mixture until it is hot.

Pack and seal

  1. Remove the cucumbers from the brine and place them in jars.

  2. Pour the hot vinegar mixture over the cucumbers.

  3. Seal the jars tightly.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Cinnamon + horseradishtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together515 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Main vegetable that becomes crisp-tender and absorbs the pickling liquid's flavour.
Cider vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the cucumbers and gives the pickle its sharp taste.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
Horseradish
Adds a pungent, sharp heat that flavours the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Seal the jars tightly. A tight seal keeps air and microbes out of the jar, so the vinegar brine can keep the cucumbers safe and stable during storage.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cider, vinegar, sugar, clove, cinnamon, pepper, horseradish):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Beetrootfits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cider, vinegar, sugar, clove, cinnamon, pepper, horseradish. 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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