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To Pickle Onions

A method for pickling small white onions in a brine of salt, water, vinegar, peppercorns, mustard seed, and optional sweet oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Pickle Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the onions

  1. Peel the onions until they are white.

  2. Scald them in a mixture of strong salt and water, then remove the onions with a skimmer.

Pickle and bottle

  1. Prepare enough boiling hot vinegar to cover the onions.

  2. Add whole peppercorns and white mustard seed over the onions, then pour the hot vinegar over them to cover.

  3. Once cold, place the onions in wide-mouthed bottles, optionally add 1 tablespoon of sweet oil, and cork them 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. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  2. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Small white onions
The vegetable being preserved; it becomes tender and mild as it pickles.
Vinegar
Acid that preserves the onions and gives them their sharp, tangy flavour.
Strong salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the onions during the scalding step.
White mustard seed
Adds a sharp, pungent aroma that flavours the pickling liquid.
Whole peppercorns
Adds mild warm spice that flavours the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Pour the hot vinegar over the onions. The vinegar must be boiling hot and fully cover the onions so the acid penetrates evenly and the onions are preserved. Letting air reach exposed onions can spoil them.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Radishfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, 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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