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Sweet Cucumber Pickles

A sweet pickle made by coating cucumbers in a molasses and vinegar syrup with cloves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cider and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,431 recipes. Both carry 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol, which smells smoky, clove. The science ↓

Sweet Cucumber Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Make the syrup

  1. In a saucepan, combine molasses, cider vinegar, and whole cloves.

  2. Heat the mixture until it is well combined.

Pour and rest

  1. Pour the syrup over the pickled cucumbers.

  2. Let it sit for two days to develop flavor.

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

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

  2. Cucumber + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,734 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  3. Cucumber + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,319 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Molasses + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,483 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Cider + clovetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,683 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Pickled cucumbers
The base vegetable that soaks up the syrup and takes on its flavor over time.
New orleans molasses
Adds sweetness, dark color, and a deep, rich flavor to the syrup.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the syrup a sharp tang and balances the sweetness.
Whole cloves
Adds warm, aromatic spice that infuses into the syrup and cucumbers.

The step that matters

Letting the pickles sit for two days. The syrup's sweetness, acidity, and spice need time to penetrate the cucumbers. Serving early leaves the flavor weak and unbalanced, so the full two-day rest is what develops the taste.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, cider, vinegar, clove):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Cucumberthe original
  4. Shallotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, cider, vinegar, 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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