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Mixed Pickles

A fermented pickle made from cauliflower, cabbage, onions, horseradish, green beans, green tomatoes, mustard seeds, pepper, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Horseradish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,832 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Combine cauliflower, cabbage, onions, horseradish, green beans, and green tomatoes in a large bowl.

  2. Soak the mixture in a strong brine for 24 hours.

  3. Drain the mixture for 3 hours.

Cook and season

  1. Add black mustard seeds, white mustard seeds, and black pepper to the drained mixture.

  2. Boil the mixture in enough vinegar to cover it.

  3. Add a little alum while boiling.

  4. Drain the mixture again.

  5. Let the mixture cool.

Finish and colour

  1. Mix in ground mustard.

  2. Cover the mixture with cider vinegar.

  3. Add turmeric to achieve the desired color.

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. Horseradish + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cauliflower + horseradishtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together139 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Cauliflower + cabbagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together305 recipes

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

  4. Cauliflower + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Cabbage + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together481 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Cauliflower
Provides the firm, crisp bulk of the pickle that holds its texture after brining and boiling.
Black mustard seed
Adds a sharp, pungent flavour that develops as the seeds are steeped in vinegar.
White mustard seed
Contributes a milder mustard bite alongside the black seed in the pickling liquid.
Green tomatoes
Add tartness and body, holding their shape through the brine and boiling.
Onions
Contribute sweetness and aroma that mellow during the long vinegar boil.
Ground mustard
Thickens and deepens the flavour of the pickling liquid, giving it a sharper mustard character.

The step that matters

Draining after the 24-hour brine. Excess brine left in the vegetables dilutes the vinegar and can make the pickle soft or overly salty, so the mixture should drain well before it is boiled.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cauliflower, cabbage, onion, horseradish, green beans, mustard, pepper):

  1. Broccolifits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cauliflower, cabbage, onion, horseradish, green beans, mustard, pepper. 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 mixed pickles recipes

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