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To Pickle Gherkins and French Beans

A pickled preparation of gherkins and French beans using vinegar, spices, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and horseradish 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 ↓

To Pickle Gherkins and French Beans

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the gherkins

  1. Mix 2 pounds of coarse sea salt into 1 gallon of spring water and add the gherkins.

  2. Wash the gherkins after 2 hours and let them drain and dry.

Make the pickling liquor

  1. Combine 1 gallon of white wine vinegar, cloves, mace, allspice, mustard seed, horseradish, bay leaves, dill, ginger, nutmeg, and salt in a pot.

  2. Boil the mixture.

Pickle and store

  1. Pour the mixture over the gherkins and cover tightly.

  2. Let the mixture sit for 24 hours.

  3. Simmer the gherkins over low heat until they turn green, being careful not to boil.

  4. Transfer the gherkins to a jar and cover tightly.

  5. Let the jar cool.

  6. Seal the jar with a bladder and leather.

  7. Store the sealed jar in a cool, dry place.

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. Mustard + horseradishtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Horseradish + dilltop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together134 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Mustard + dilltop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together560 recipes

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

  5. Allspice + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Gherkins
Are the vegetable being pickled, becoming firm and crisp after brining and vinegar soaking.
White wine vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the gherkins and gives the pickle its sharp flavour.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the gherkins during the brine, firming them and seasoning them.
Cloves
Add warm, aromatic spice flavour to the pickling liquor.

The step that matters

Simmering the gherkins. Heating gently until they turn green without boiling keeps the gherkins firm; boiling would soften them and can cause them to lose their texture.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (white wine, vinegar, clove, allspice, mustard, horseradish, dill):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, vinegar, clove, allspice, mustard, horseradish, dill. 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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