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Salad

Dressed Cucumbers

A salad of sliced cucumbers dressed with oil, vinegar, salt, cayenne, and optional pickled shallot vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Dressed Cucumbers

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 ↓

Dressed Cucumbers

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cucumbers

  1. Cut cucumbers into lengths of about 1 inch and remove the rind.

  2. Pare the cucumbers into thin ribbons until you reach the watery part, which should be discarded.

  3. Sprinkle the ribbons with cayenne and coarse sea salt. Let the ribbons drain for a bit.

  4. Arrange the drained ribbons in a clean dish.

Dress and serve

  1. Sauce the cucumbers with oil mixed with chili vinegar or equal parts chili and common vinegar.

  2. If desired, add a teaspoon of vinegar from pickled shallots for extra flavor.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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).

  2. Cucumber + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,991 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Form the main body of the dish, providing crisp, watery texture once drained.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture from the cucumber ribbons, seasoning them as they drain.
Oil
Carries the dressing and adds richness and a smooth mouthfeel to the cucumbers.
Chili vinegar
Adds acidity and heat that cut through the oil and brighten the cucumbers.

The step that matters

Draining the ribbons. Salt draws water out of the cucumber through osmosis. Discarding the watery core and letting the ribbons drain well keeps the dressing from being diluted and the texture from turning limp.

Swap the cucumber

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Cabbagefits better
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, vinegar. 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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