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French Tomato Pickle

A pickled tomato and onion mixture flavored with cloves, allspice, black pepper, ginger, mustard, cinnamon, and brown sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

French Tomato Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the onions and tomatoes.

  2. Soak them in salt and water overnight.

Cook and jar

  1. Drain and cook in ½ gallon of vinegar for 30 minutes.

  2. Drain again and add another ½ gallon of vinegar, sugar, and spices.

  3. Cook for 2 hours or more, then jar the mixture.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Allspice + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main bulk and fruity body of the pickle as they break down during cooking.
Onions
Add savory bulk and soften into the mixture during the long simmer.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the pickle and sharpens its flavour.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps thicken the mixture as it cooks down.

The step that matters

Cook for 2 hours or more, then jar the mixture. Long simmering lets the vinegar and sugar concentrate and the vegetables break down into a thick, stable pickle. Stopping early leaves it watery and less safely preserved.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clove, allspice, pepper, sugar, vinegar, tomato, ginger):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clove, allspice, pepper, sugar, vinegar, tomato, 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.

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