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Dessert

Melon, Pickled

A preserved melon sliced and cured in vinegar and sugar syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Orange and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,987 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Melon, Pickled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the melons

  1. Peel the melons and remove the seeds.

  2. Slice the melons and place them in a bowl of vinegar.

  3. Cover and let sit for a week or more.

  4. Drain the melons and simmer them in fresh vinegar until tender.

  5. Drain the slices again and let them dry.

Make the syrup and pack the jars

  1. Make a syrup by boiling together sugar and water until dissolved, then skim the syrup.

  2. Place the melons in bottles, covering them with the syrup.

  3. Discard half of the syrup and top off the bottles with boiled vinegar infused with cloves.

  4. Let it cool before adding.

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. Orange + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,987 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Melon + orangetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together153 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  3. Melon + clovetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together232 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Melon + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together416 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Melons
Form the main body of the pickle, becoming tender and absorbing the vinegar and syrup flavour.
Good vinegar
Acidifies the melon, preserving it and giving the pickle its sharp, tangy character.
Sugar
Sweetens the syrup and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Cloves
Adds warm, aromatic spice to the vinegar used for topping off the bottles.

The step that matters

Simmering the drained slices until tender. Simmering in fresh vinegar softens the melon's firm flesh so it can take up flavour. Undercooking leaves it hard, while overcooking turns it mushy and fragile.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Peppermintfits better
  3. Gingerfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against melon, orange, 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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