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Cucumber Vinegar

A pickled cucumber recipe preserved in boiling vinegar with salt and peppercorns.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,734 recipes. Both carry 2-methylbutyl acetate, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Cucumber Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wipe the cucumbers.

  2. Slice the cucumbers.

  3. Place the sliced cucumbers in a stone jar, leaving the peel on.

Pickle

  1. Pour enough boiling vinegar over the cucumbers to cover them well.

  2. Add 1 teaspoon of salt and ⅔ teaspoon of peppercorns for every 1½ pints of vinegar.

  3. Let it sit for 1 to 2 months, ensuring it is well protected from air.

Bottle

  1. Strain the mixture, allow it to settle, and pour it into small dry bottles.

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. Cucumber + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,734 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Young cucumbers
Provide the main body and crisp texture of the pickle.
Boiling vinegar
Supplies acidity that preserves the cucumbers and gives the pickle its sour flavour.
Salt
Seasons the pickle and helps draw out moisture from the cucumbers.

The step that matters

Keeping the jar protected from air while it sits. Exposure to air during the long resting period can let surface spoilage and mould start, so the cucumbers must stay fully covered in vinegar and well sealed off from air.

“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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