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Mixed Pickles

A pickled assortment of green tomatoes, peppers, onions, cucumbers, beans, corn, cabbage, celery, cauliflower, and spices in vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Beans and lima beans match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 156 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the green tomatoes, green peppers, small onions, cucumbers, string beans, lima beans, green corn, cabbage, celery, and cauliflower in saltwater overnight.

  2. In the morning, drain the vegetables.

Make the pickle

  1. Add sugar, black mustard seeds, white mustard seeds, and celery seeds to the drained vegetables.

  2. Mix ground mustard with vinegar, then combine the mixture with the vegetables.

  3. Boil the mixture for 30 minutes.

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. Beans + lima beanstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together156 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Tomato + beanstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,713 recipes

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

  3. Beans + corntop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,211 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Lima beans + corntop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together222 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Tomato + cucumbertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the vegetables and gives the pickle its sharp flavor.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar and adds sweetness to the pickle.
Mustard seeds
Contribute pungent, sharp flavor that deepens during boiling.
Ground mustard
Adds pungency and helps thicken and flavor the vinegar mixture.
Green tomatoes
Provide firm texture and bulk that holds up to brining and boiling.

The step that matters

Overnight saltwater soak. The salt draws water out of the vegetables and firms their texture. Skipping or shortening the soak leaves the vegetables soft and less able to hold their crunch after boiling.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, cucumber, beans, lima beans, corn, cabbage):

  1. Okrafits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, cucumber, beans, lima beans, corn, cabbage. 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.

More mixed pickles recipes

English 3 See all 133 →

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