Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓
Sliced Cucumber Pickle
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the cucumbers
Peel and slice the cucumbers thinly.
Sprinkle the sliced cucumbers with a little coarse sea salt and let stand for 24 hours.
Drain off the water thoroughly.
If the mixture is too salty, wash before adding vinegar.
Prepare the onions
Slice the onions as you would for ordinary cucumbers.
Pour boiling salt water over the onions and let them stand for 30 minutes.
Drain the onions.
Mix the drained onions with the cucumbers.
Pickle and seal
In a porcelain kettle, add enough cider vinegar to cover the mixture.
Add a little brown sugar, ground pepper, celery seed, and white mustard seed.
Bring the mixture to a boil, then add the onions and cucumbers.
As soon as it is hot, pour the mixture into jars and seal.
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.
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Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,169 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,281 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together16,012 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together9,259 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,431 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cucumbers
- Form the bulk of the pickle and, once salted and drained, give it a crisp texture.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws water out of the cucumbers and onions, firming them and reducing excess moisture.
- Onions
- Add savory flavor and crunch that contrasts with the cucumbers.
- Cider vinegar
- Provides the acidity that preserves the mixture and gives the pickle its tang.
- Brown sugar
- Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
The step that matters
Draining and rinsing after salting. Salt draws water out of the cucumbers, and any salt left behind makes the pickle too salty. Draining thoroughly and rinsing when needed keeps the texture crisp and the flavor balanced before the vinegar is added.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, cider, vinegar, sugar, pepper, celery, mustard):
- Horseradishfits better
- Lettucefits better
- Radishfits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, cider, vinegar, sugar, pepper, celery, mustard. 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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