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To Pickle Lemons, and Limes

A method for pickling lemons using salt, vinegar, spices, and fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Turmeric and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,776 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

To Pickle Lemons, and Limes

Oven, in the book's wordsA very cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lemons

  1. Wipe the lemons clean and make four deep incisions in each, from stalk to blossom end, without dividing the fruit.

  2. Stuff the lemons with salt and place them in a deep dish in a sunny spot for 7 to 10 days, turning and basting them with their own juice.

Pack and pickle

  1. Rub the lemons with turmeric, then place them in a stone jar with garlic and onions.

  2. Boil the vinegar with ginger, black pepper, and mustard seed, then pour it over the lemons.

  3. Cover the jar with a plate and let it sit until the next day.

  4. Add capsicums or chilies, then seal the jar with a skin and thick paper.

Finish

  1. For immediate use, place the lemons in a cool oven overnight.

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. Turmeric + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Pepper + capsicumtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,571 recipes

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

  3. Turmeric + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Lemon + turmerictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lemons
Their peel and juice supply the main sour flavour and aroma of the pickle.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out juice and preserves the lemons by inhibiting spoilage microbes.
White wine vinegar
Adds acidity that preserves the lemons and sharpens the brine.
Ginger
Contributes a warm, aromatic pungency to the brine.
Mustard seed
Adds a sharp, pungent flavour and aroma to the pickling liquid.
Garlic
Adds pungent aroma that mellows and deepens during pickling.

The step that matters

Salting and sunning the lemons. Salt must fully penetrate the incisions and fruit so the lemons soften and cure evenly; too little salt or time risks spoilage. The lemons need to stay submerged in their own juice so they do not dry or mould.

Swap the turmeric

The recipe marks turmeric as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, white wine, vinegar, ginger, pepper, mustard, capsicum):

  1. Tarragonfits about as well
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Corianderfits about as well
  4. Turmericthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, white wine, vinegar, ginger, pepper, mustard, capsicum. 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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