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Mustard PICKLES---No. 5

A pickled cucumber recipe using vinegar, mustard, spices, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove 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 ↓

Mustard PICKLES---No. 5

Ingredients

Directions

Make the pickling liquid

  1. In a large pot, combine vinegar, ground ginger, allspice, turmeric powder, shallots, garlic, black pepper, whole cloves, mustard, and coarse sea salt.

  2. Boil the mixture gently for 15 minutes.

  3. In a separate bowl, mix turmeric and mustard with a little cold vinegar until smooth. Add this mixture to the boiling pot.

Pickle the cucumbers

  1. Once cooled, add the small cucumbers to the pickling 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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Ginger + turmerictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Ginger + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Turmeric + shallottop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together282 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the cucumbers and gives the pickle its sharp flavour.
Mustard
Adds pungent, sharp flavour and thickens the liquid as it is mixed in.
Turmeric powder
Gives the pickling liquid its yellow colour and a mild, earthy aroma.
Small cucumbers
The main vegetable that absorbs the spiced, acidic pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before adding the cucumbers. Adding cucumbers to very hot liquid softens them and makes them mushy, so the pickling mixture should be cooled first.

Swap the garlic

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Cardamomfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, ginger, allspice, turmeric, shallot, pepper, clove. 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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