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Fig Pickles

A pickled fig recipe using brine, vinegar, sugar, spices, and optional horseradish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Fig Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Gather figs when fully swollen but not quite ripe, leaving the stems on.

  2. Soak figs in moderately strong brine (salt and water) for 10 to 12 hours.

  3. Rinse figs with clear water and place them in glass or stone jars.

Make the pickling liquid

  1. In a kettle, combine 1 gallon of pure strong vinegar with 1 gallon of light brown sugar and your choice of spices.

  2. Heat the mixture over the fire and stir until the sugar dissolves and the vinegar simmers.

Pour and finish

  1. Pour the hot vinegar mixture over the figs, covering them by about an inch.

  2. Repeat the scalding and pouring process 3 times.

  3. Add a small piece of horse radish for extra flavor if desired.

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. Horse + radishtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together529 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  3. Fig + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together614 recipes

    Shared aroma: cinnamyl acetate (sweet aromatic, cinnamon).

  4. Fig + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together404 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  5. Cinnamon + radishtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together69 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Figs
Provide the fruit itself, softened by the brine so they absorb the sweet-sour liquid.
Pure strong vinegar
Its acidity sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the figs.
Light brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar and deepens the flavor.
Cinnamon
Adds warm aromatic flavor to the pickling liquid.
Cloves
Adds warm, pungent aroma to the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Keep the figs fully covered by the hot vinegar mixture. Submerging the figs by about an inch keeps them out of contact with air, which limits spoilage and mold. Hot liquid also penetrates the fruit and carries the sugar and spices into it.

Swap the radish

The recipe marks radish as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fig, vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, clove, horse):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against fig, vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, clove, horse. 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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