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Pickled Onions

Pickled onions preserved in vinegar and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,400 recipes. Both carry methyleugenol, which smells clove, spice. The science ↓

Pickled Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the onions

  1. Peel the small white button onions.

  2. Soak the onions in brine for four days, changing the brine twice.

  3. Boil fresh brine and add the onions, boiling for three minutes.

  4. Transfer the onions to cold water and let them sit for four hours.

Pack and pickle

  1. Pack the onions into jars, adding whole mace, white peppercorns, and cloves.

  2. Fill the jars with scalding vinegar mixed with sugar.

  3. Cork the jars while hot.

  4. Let the pickled onions sit for a month before using.

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. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  2. Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  5. Clove + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Small white button onions
The main vegetable; it becomes tender and mild after brining and pickling.
Scalding vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the onions and gives them their sharp flavor.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
Brine
Salt draws water out of the onions and seasons them before pickling.

The step that matters

Let the pickled onions sit for a month before using. The vinegar and spices need time to penetrate the onions and mellow the sharp raw flavor. Using them early leaves them harsh and under-flavored.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mace, clove, vinegar, sugar. 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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