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Cabbage, Red, Pickled

A pickled cabbage dish made with red cabbage, salt, pepper, ginger, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cabbage, Red, Pickled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Do not cut the cabbage until it has been slightly frost-bitten.

  2. Remove the outer leaves and cut the cabbage into fine cross slices.

  3. Place the cabbage in a large shallow dish and spread a layer of salt over it.

  4. Let it sit for 24 hours, then squeeze out the purple juice.

Pack and pickle

  1. Transfer the cabbage to pickle jars, adding a little black pepper and bruised ginger between layers.

  2. Fill the jars with cold vinegar and cork securely.

  3. The pickled cabbage is ready to use immediately.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  2. Cabbage + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together545 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

  4. Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Red cabbage
Forms the main body of the pickle and holds the crisp texture.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the cabbage, softening it and concentrating its flavour before pickling.
Cold vinegar
Acidity that preserves the cabbage and gives the pickle its sharp taste.
Bruised ginger
Adds a warm, aromatic note that flavours the layers of cabbage.

The step that matters

Squeezing out the purple juice after salting. Salt draws liquid from the cabbage over 24 hours. Pouring off or squeezing out that juice removes excess water and bitter pigment, so the cabbage stays crisp and absorbs the vinegar well.

Swap the ginger

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

  1. Dillfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, pepper, vinegar. 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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