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Mixed Pickles

A preserved mixture of cucumbers, peppers, cauliflower, cabbage, horseradish, beans, tomatoes, and mustard in vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Horseradish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,832 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Combine cucumbers, green peppers, cauliflower, cabbage, horseradish, beans, and tomatoes in a large bowl.

  2. Soak the mixture in brine for 24 hours.

  3. Drain the mixture for 3 hours.

Make the pickle

  1. Add mustard seeds and black pepper.

  2. Cover with enough vinegar to submerge.

  3. Bring to a boil.

  4. Add a small piece of alum.

  5. Drain again.

  6. Let cool.

  7. Mix with prepared mustard.

  8. Cover the mixture with strong vinegar.

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. Horseradish + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cucumber + cauliflowertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together584 recipes

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

  3. Beans + tomatotop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,713 recipes

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

  4. Cauliflower + horseradishtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together139 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Cauliflower + cabbagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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 bulk of the pickle that holds up to brining.
Cauliflower
Adds crunchy texture and absorbs the brine and vinegar flavor.
Cabbage
Adds crunch and bulk, soaking up the brine and vinegar.
Green tomatoes
Contribute firm texture and tart acidity to the mix.
White mustard seed
Adds sharp, pungent flavor that mellows during pickling.
Prepared mustard
Adds sharpness and helps the pickle's overall mustard flavor.

The step that matters

Drain the mixture after brining and again after boiling. Removing excess liquid keeps the vegetables crisp and stops the vinegar from being diluted, so the pickle stays firm and well flavored.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Broccolifits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Beetrootfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

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