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Ripe Tomato Pickle

A preserved tomato pickle made with tomatoes, celery, red peppers, onion, salt, sugar, mustard seed, cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Ripe Tomato Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Mix all ingredients in the order given.

  2. Transfer the mixture to a stone jar and cover it.

  3. Let it stand for one week before using.

  4. This mixture can be kept for up to one year.

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 + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 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

Tomatoes
Provide the main body and moisture of the pickle.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that preserves the pickle and gives it its tang.
Mustard seed
Contributes pungent flavour and a slight crunch to the pickle.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the vegetables.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, celery, pepper, sugar, mustard, clove, cinnamon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, celery, pepper, sugar, mustard, clove, cinnamon. 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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