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Pickled Crab-apples

Pickled crab apples are preserved crab apples soaked in a sweet vinegar solution.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Pickled Crab-apples

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the apples

  1. Remove the blossom end from the crab apples.

  2. Steam the crab apples until tender and place them in jars.

Pickle and seal

  1. Boil the vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves for 15 minutes.

  2. Pour the hot mixture over the crab apples and seal the 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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  3. Apple + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,774 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Crab apples
Provide the fruit that becomes tender and absorbs the sweet-sour pickling syrup.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps preserve the fruit by binding water in the syrup.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the pickle its tang and helps preserve it.
Cinnamon stick
Contributes warm aroma to the pickling syrup.
Whole cloves
Contributes warm, spiced aroma to the pickling syrup.

The step that matters

Pouring the hot mixture over the crab apples. The syrup must be hot when poured so it penetrates the fruit and seals the jars properly. Acidity and sugar together help inhibit spoilage, so the vinegar and sugar should be fully boiled before use.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (crab, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, clove):

  1. Quincefits about as well
  2. Vanillafits about as well
  3. Raisinfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against crab, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, clove. 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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