Name: Onions, to Pickle
Ingredients: white onions; coarse sea salt; water; boiling vinegar; ginger; white pepper

Why it works: Onion and ginger are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,595 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Onions, to Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Peel the onions until they look white.
Boil water with coarse sea salt and pour it over the onions.
Let the onions stand in the saltwater for 24 hours, keeping the vessel covered.
After 24 hours, wipe the onions dry and let them cool.
Pour boiling vinegar with ginger and white pepper over the onions, ensuring the vinegar covers them completely.

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.

Onion + gingertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,595 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,226 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Ginger + white peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together388 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Vinegar + gingertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,126 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Vinegar + white peppertop 20% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,154 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).