Name: Another Way to Pickle Young Onions
Ingredients: small onions; salt; water; white wine vinegar; whole black pepper; cloves

Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Another Way to Pickle Young Onions

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Peel the small onions.
Soak them in salt and water for 48 hours, changing the water 2-3 times.
Drain the onions and let them dry completely.
Place the dry onions in small jars.
Boil white wine vinegar with whole black pepper and cloves, then let it cool.
Pour the cooled vinegar over the onions in the jars.

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.

Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together17,451 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,776 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Onion + white winetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,535 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together16,901 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (white wine, vinegar, pepper, clove):

Capsicumfits better
Shallotfits better
Mustardfits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, vinegar, pepper, clove. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.