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Mixed Pickles

A brined pickle mixture of cucumbers, green peppers, horseradish, onions, bean pods, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Horseradish and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,832 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Combine cucumbers, green peppers, horseradish, onions, and bean pods in a brine that can float an egg for 24 hours.

  2. Drain the mixture for 3 hours.

Make the dressing

  1. Scald 2 gallons of white vinegar and add mustard seeds, cayenne pepper, and turmeric.

  2. Pour the vinegar mixture over the pickles and let it cool.

  3. Add a pint of prepared mustard when cold.

Store

  1. Store pickles in very cold brine with ice.

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. Horseradish + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Cucumber + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together640 recipes

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

  3. Mustard + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  5. Horseradish + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together437 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Small cucumbers
Form the main body of the pickles, staying firm and crisp after brining.
White vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the pickles and gives them their sharp flavor.
White mustard seed
Adds pungent, earthy heat that flavors the hot vinegar mixture.
Black mustard seed
Adds sharper, more pungent heat to the vinegar mixture.
Turmeric
Gives the pickles their yellow color and a mild earthy aroma.
White onions
Add sweetness and texture to the mixed pickles.

The step that matters

Let the vinegar mixture cool before adding the mustard. Prepared mustard is added when the brine is cold, because heat can dull its sharp flavor and change its texture. Adding it to hot vinegar risks a weaker, muddier result.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, pepper, horseradish, vinegar, mustard, turmeric):

  1. Cauliflowerfits better
  2. Radishfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, pepper, horseradish, vinegar, mustard, turmeric. 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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