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Chow Chow

A pickled vegetable relish made with cucumbers, onions, cauliflower, peppers, tomatoes, vinegar, mustard, sugar, flour, turmeric, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 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 ↓

Chow Chow

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine large cucumbers, small cucumbers, onions, cauliflower, green peppers, and green tomatoes in a large bowl.

  2. Cover the vegetables with salt and water and let sit overnight.

Cook and pickle

  1. Cook the vegetables in the brine until tender, except for the large cucumbers.

  2. Pour vinegar and spices over the cooked vegetables.

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

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

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

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

  4. Cucumber + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

  5. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 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

Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the vegetables.
Cauliflower
Firm texture that holds its shape when simmered in the brine.
Green tomatoes
Tart flavor and a firm body that stays intact during cooking.
Mustard
Provides sharp, pungent flavor that defines the relish.

The step that matters

Cooking the vegetables until tender. Heat softens the vegetables' cell walls, so overcooking turns them mushy. Leaving out the large cucumbers keeps them crisp, since they soften more readily than the other vegetables.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, cauliflower, pepper, tomato, vinegar, mustard, sugar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, cauliflower, pepper, tomato, vinegar, mustard, 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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