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Olive Oil Cucumber Pickles

Pickled cucumbers with olive oil, celery seed, mustard seed, onions, salt, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Olive Oil Cucumber Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the cucumbers thinly and sprinkle with salt.

  2. Let them stand for three hours.

Dress and cover

  1. Mix the celery seed, olive oil, and white mustard seed together.

  2. Pour the mixture over the cucumbers and finely chopped onions.

  3. Cover with cold 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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  3. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Olive + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Olive oil
Carries the spice flavors and adds richness and a smooth mouthfeel.
White mustard seed
Adds a sharp, pungent bite that mellows as the pickles stand.
Celery seed
Contributes a savory, aromatic flavor.
White onions
Add sweetness and savory flavor to the brine-soaked cucumbers.
Cold vinegar
Provides acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the pickles.

The step that matters

Salting and standing the cucumbers. Salt draws water out of the thin cucumber slices through osmosis. Letting them stand for the full three hours removes enough moisture to keep the pickles crisp rather than limp once the dressing is added.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, olive, mustard, vinegar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, olive, mustard, vinegar. 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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