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Red Cabbage and Cauliflower

A pickled dish of red cabbage and cauliflower seasoned with salt, vinegar, peppercorns, mace, cinnamon, and alum.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Red Cabbage and Cauliflower

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Remove the loose leaves from the cabbage and quarter it.

  2. Layer the cabbage and coarse sea salt in a large jar, alternating layers.

  3. Let the mixture stand for several days.

Pickle

  1. Scald the vinegar with peppercorns, mace, and cinnamon in a pot.

  2. Add a small piece of alum to the vinegar mixture.

  3. Pour the hot vinegar over the cabbage in the jar, ensuring it remains submerged.

  4. Scald the vinegar mixture three to four times.

  5. Pour the scalded vinegar over the cabbage to tenderize.

  6. Pickle cauliflower in the same manner.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Mace + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Red cabbage
Forms the main body of the pickle, becoming tender and crisp-textured as it cures in the brine.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the cabbage through osmosis, firming the vegetable and seasoning it for pickling.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the vegetables and gives the pickle its sharp flavor.
Alum
Helps keep the vegetables firm during pickling by strengthening their cell walls.

The step that matters

Pour the scalded vinegar over the cabbage while it stays submerged. Vegetables that rise above the liquid can spoil or discolor. Keeping every piece under the hot vinegar ensures even pickling and helps preserve it.

Swap the clove

The recipe marks clove as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, vinegar, mace, cinnamon, allspice):

  1. Clovethe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Gingerfits less well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, vinegar, mace, cinnamon, allspice. 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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