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Chow Chow

Chow Chow is a pickled vegetable mixture of cucumbers, onions, string beans, cauliflower, and spices in vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,038 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Chow Chow

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil vinegar with mustard, ginger, pepper, mace, and cloves.

  2. Soak mustard and ginger in cold water before adding to the vinegar.

  3. Peel and chop cucumbers and onions, and prepare string beans and cauliflower.

  4. Sprinkle vegetables with coarse sea salt and let them sit for 10 minutes.

Pack and store

  1. Once the vinegar is cool, pack the vegetables into large bottles or jars.

  2. Pour the vinegar over the vegetables and seal tightly.

  3. Let it sit for one week before using.

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. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mustard + cucumbertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Mustard + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

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

Vinegar
Provides the acidic liquid that preserves the vegetables and gives the pickle its sharp flavor.
Ground mustard
Adds pungent heat and flavor that carries through the pickling liquid.
Cucumbers
Form the crisp, firm bulk of the pickle.
Onions
Add sharpness and savory depth that mellows during the rest period.
Cauliflower
Adds firm texture and absorbs the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Let the vinegar cool before packing. Hot vinegar poured over or mixed with the vegetables softens them and can cook them partly, leaving a mushy texture. Cooling it first keeps the vegetables crisp.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, mustard, ginger, pepper, clove, cucumber, onion. 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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