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Persian Pickle

A pickled mixture of tomatoes, onions, string beans, cauliflower, and nasturtium seeds in a vinegar, sugar, and spice brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cauliflower and turmeric match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 514 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Persian Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Parboil the onions, string beans, and cauliflower separately.

  2. Soak the nasturtium seeds and green tomatoes in brine for 24 hours.

Make the pickling sauce

  1. Heat the vinegar in a pot.

  2. Mix the turmeric and ground mustard with a little cold vinegar, then add to the hot vinegar, stirring with a wooden spoon until thick.

  3. Add the olive oil, sugar, and mustard seeds to the mixture and cook for 4 minutes.

Pack and pour

  1. Pour the mixture over the prepared vegetables.

  2. Pack the vegetables in earthenware or glass jars.

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. Cauliflower + turmerictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together514 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Tomato + beanstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,713 recipes

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

  3. Beans + cauliflowertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together290 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Beans + turmerictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together419 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Provide the main body of the pickle, softening slightly after soaking in brine.
Cider vinegar
Supplies the acidity that preserves the vegetables and gives the pickle its sharp flavor.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
Olive oil
Adds fat and richness to the sauce, carrying flavor through the pickle.
Turmeric
Gives the sauce its yellow color and an earthy aroma.
Mustard seed
Adds sharp flavor and a pungent aroma to the sauce.

The step that matters

Stirring the turmeric and ground mustard into the hot vinegar. Ground mustard and turmeric must be fully smooth before they meet the hot vinegar, or they clump. Stirring steadily as the sauce thickens keeps it even and prevents scorching on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, beans, cauliflower, cider, vinegar, sugar, turmeric):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, beans, cauliflower, cider, vinegar, sugar, turmeric. 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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