Skip to main content
Main

French Pickles

A pickled mixture of green tomatoes and onions in a vinegar and spice brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

French Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Mix sliced tomatoes and onions with salt and let drain overnight.

  2. Boil the drained mixture in 2 quarts of water and 1 quart of vinegar for 15 minutes.

  3. Drain in a colander.

Make the spiced vinegar

  1. In a pot, combine 4 quarts of vinegar, sugar, mustard seed, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, cayenne pepper, and ground mustard.

  2. Boil the mixture for 15 minutes.

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. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  5. Mustard + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,581 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the pickle and absorb the brine and spiced vinegar flavour.
Onions
Add sharpness and body that softens during boiling and blends into the pickle.
Salt
Draws water out of the sliced vegetables overnight, firming them and seasoning the pickle.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the pickle and gives it its sharp, tangy flavour.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
White mustard seed
Adds a pungent, slightly bitter flavour and crunch to the pickle.

The step that matters

Draining the salted vegetables overnight. Salt draws water out of the tomatoes and onions through osmosis. Draining well removes that liquid, so the pickle stays firm and the brine stays properly concentrated rather than watery.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Radishfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, vinegar, sugar, mustard, cinnamon, clove, ginger. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipesTomato BisqueTomato Bisque61 recipesCream Tomato SoupCream Tomato Soup28 recipes