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Mustard Pickles

A pickled vegetable mixture of cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, celery, cauliflower, and onions flavored with mustard, turmeric, paprika, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and cauliflower match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 584 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Mustard Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Brine the vegetables

  1. Soak all vegetables except tomatoes in a brine made of 1 cup salt and 3 quarts water for 24 hours.

  2. For tomatoes, make a brine with 2 cups salt.

  3. Drain the vegetables.

  4. Add fresh brine.

  5. Cook until soft but not broken.

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, mix 1 cup flour, 2 cups sugar, 6 teaspoons mustard, 1 teaspoon turmeric, and 1 teaspoon paprika.

  2. Add 1 cup water and 3 cups vinegar to the mixture.

  3. Cook the mixture directly over heat for 5 minutes.

  4. Cook the mixture in a double boiler for 30 minutes.

Pack and seal

  1. Pour the hot mixture over the vegetables.

  2. Jar the mixture.

  3. Seal the jar.

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. Cucumber + cauliflowertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together584 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Cucumber + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Celery + cauliflowertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together488 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Provide the crisp, bulky pickled vegetable base that absorbs the mustard sauce.
Green tomatoes
Add tart, firm pieces that hold their shape in the thick sauce.
Cauliflower
Adds firm texture and bulk that soaks up the sauce.
All-purpose flour
Thickens the vinegar and sugar mixture into a smooth, thick sauce.
Vinegar
Supplies the sharp acidity that preserves and flavors the pickles.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard with sweetness.

The step that matters

Cook the flour mixture gently and evenly. Flour thickens only as its starch swells in heated liquid. Cooking directly over heat can scorch the mixture on the bottom, so a double boiler spreads gentle heat and keeps the sauce smooth without lumps.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, tomato, pepper, celery, cauliflower, flour, sugar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, tomato, pepper, celery, cauliflower, flour, sugar. 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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