Skip to main content
Main

Chopped Tomato Pickle

A pickle made from chopped green tomatoes, onions, cabbage, peppers, celery, and spices, cooked slowly over low heat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Chopped Tomato Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the green tomatoes, onions, cabbage, green peppers, and celery finely.

  2. In a large bowl, stir in the salt, ground mustard, cayenne pepper, ground cinnamon, and ground cloves, then mix well and let it sit for 2 hours.

Cook

  1. Cook the mixture slowly over low heat for 2 hours.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Form the bulk of the pickle and supply its tart, fresh base.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the vegetables, firming them and concentrating the flavor.
Onions
Add savory depth and aroma that mellow as the pickle cooks.
Cabbage
Adds bulk and a crisp texture that softens during slow cooking.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture slowly over low heat. Low, slow heat lets the chopped vegetables soften and their flavors meld without scorching on the bottom of the pot. Stirring regularly helps prevent sticking during the long cook.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, cabbage, pepper, celery, mustard, cinnamon, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, cabbage, pepper, celery, mustard, 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.

More tomato pickle recipes

Green 105Sweet 26French 6Frosted 4 See all 48 →

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipesRed CabbageRed Cabbage65 recipes