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Sweet Pickled Cantaloupes

A sweet pickled cantaloupe prepared with cider vinegar, brown sugar, cloves, cinnamon, and mace.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Sweet Pickled Cantaloupes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the melon

  1. Cut the cantaloupes or muskmelons lengthwise and peel them.

  2. Place the melon pieces in a stone jar and cover with cider vinegar.

  3. Let stand for 24 hours.

Make the syrup

  1. Measure the vinegar and remove 3 pints or 2 quarts.

  2. For every quart of vinegar, add 3 pounds of brown sugar, ½ ounce of cloves, ½ ounce of cinnamon, and ½ ounce of mace.

  3. Boil the mixture until the melon is clear and easily penetrated with a fork or straw.

Jar and serve

  1. Remove the melon and place it in jars.

  2. Boil the syrup for an additional 15 minutes.

  3. Pour the hot syrup over the melon.

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. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Cinnamon + macetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe cantaloupes or muskmelons
Form the main body of the pickle, becoming tender and translucent as they cook in the syrup.
Cider vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the melon and gives the pickle its tangy flavour.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps thicken the syrup, balancing the sharp vinegar.
Whole cloves
Contribute warm, aromatic spice flavour to the syrup.
Whole cinnamon
Contributes warm, sweet aroma and flavour to the syrup.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture until the melon is clear and easily penetrated. Cooking must be continued until the melon turns translucent and a fork or straw passes through easily. Undercooked melon stays firm and opaque, while overcooking makes it soft and collapse.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cider, vinegar, sugar, clove, cinnamon):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cider, vinegar, sugar, 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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