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Mixed Pickles

A pickled assortment of cucumbers, peppers, cauliflower, cabbage, onions, horseradish, beans, tomatoes, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and cauliflower match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 584 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Combine cucumbers, green peppers, 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.

Season and pickle

  1. Add black and white mustard seeds and black ground pepper.

  2. Cover the mixture with enough vinegar to submerge it.

  3. Bring the mixture to a boil, adding a little alum.

  4. Drain the mixture again.

  5. Let the mixture cool.

  6. Mix in ground mustard.

  7. Cover the mixture with cider vinegar.

  8. Add turmeric to achieve 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. Cucumber + cauliflowertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together584 recipes

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

  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. Cucumber + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together640 recipes

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

  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

Cucumbers
Provide the crisp, firm body of the pickle that holds up after brining.
Black and white mustard seeds
Add pungent, sharp flavor that mellows during pickling in the vinegar.
Cider vinegar
Acidifies the mixture, preserving the vegetables and giving the pickle its tang.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma that soften and mellow during the long pickling.
Cauliflower
Contributes firm texture and absorbs the brine and vinegar flavors.
Horseradish
Adds sharp, pungent heat that fades as the pickle matures.

The step that matters

Soaking in strong brine. Salt draws water out of the vegetables through osmosis, firming them and reducing moisture so they stay crisp rather than soggy in the vinegar. The 24-hour soak and the drain afterward set that texture.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Broccolifits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, pepper, cauliflower, cabbage, horseradish, green beans, tomato. 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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