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Regent Pickle

A pickle made from cucumbers, cabbage, onions, and spices, simmered briefly after mixing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Regent Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the cucumbers, cabbage, and onions very fine.

  2. In a large bowl, combine the chopped vegetables with salt, sugar, allspice, cloves, dry mustard, celery seed, and white mustard seed. Mix all ingredients well.

Cook

  1. Transfer the mixture to a pot and heat over medium heat for a few minutes, stirring constantly.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Allspice + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  5. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Provide the bulk of the pickle and release moisture that the salt draws out.
Cabbage
Adds crunch and bulk to the pickle, holding its texture through the cooking.
Onions
Add pungency and savory depth that mellows during cooking.
Sugar
Balances the salt and vinegar-free sharpness with sweetness.
White mustard seed
Contributes a sharp, pungent bite and aroma to the pickle.

The step that matters

Heating the mixture over medium heat. Stirring constantly keeps the chopped vegetables from scorching on the bottom of the pot, since sugar caramelizes and burns easily at high heat.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, cabbage, sugar, allspice, clove, mustard, celery):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, cabbage, sugar, allspice, clove, mustard, celery. 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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