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French Pickles

A pickled mixture of green tomatoes, cucumbers, and onions seasoned with salt, spices, mustard, turmeric, brown sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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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 ↓

French Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Combine sliced green tomatoes, cucumbers, and onions in a bowl.

  2. Add coarse sea salt and let it stand for 24 hours.

  3. Drain the mixture through a sieve.

Make the pickle

  1. In a separate bowl, mix celery seed, allspice, white mustard seed, black pepper, turmeric, brown sugar, mustard, and vinegar.

  2. Combine the drained vegetables with the spice mixture.

  3. Store in jars and refrigerate.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Allspice + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Mustard + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  5. Allspice + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together629 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

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the pickle and absorb the brine and spiced vinegar flavor.
Cucumbers
Add crisp, watery texture that salting helps firm up before pickling.
Sliced onions
Contribute sharp flavor and aroma that mellows during the salted rest.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the vegetables, firming them and helping preserve them.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the pickle and gives it its tang.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharp acidity of the vinegar.

The step that matters

Draining after the 24-hour salt rest. Salt draws out a large amount of liquid from the vegetables. Draining thoroughly keeps the pickle from being watery and lets the vegetables absorb the spiced vinegar mixture rather than diluting it.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, cucumber, celery, allspice, mustard, pepper, turmeric):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Cauliflowerfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, cucumber, celery, allspice, mustard, pepper, turmeric. 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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