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To Pickle Red Cabbage

A method for pickling red cabbage in vinegar with spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,840 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

To Pickle Red Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Remove the coarse leaves from the red cabbage and wipe them clean.

  2. Slice the cabbage finely and place it in a sieve.

  3. Sprinkle the cabbage with coarse sea salt and let it drain overnight.

  4. Pack the drained cabbage into glass jars.

Make the pickling liquid and pour

  1. In a pot, combine vinegar, sugar, mace, cloves, whole white peppers, and celery seed.

  2. Boil the vinegar and spices for five minutes.

  3. Pour the boiling hot mixture over the cabbage in the jars.

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. Cabbage + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,840 recipes

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

  2. Clove + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

  3. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Mace + white peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  5. Cabbage + clovetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together933 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Red cabbage
Provides the main bulk and the crisp texture that holds up after pickling.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that preserves the cabbage and gives it its sharp, tangy flavour.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the sliced cabbage, softening it and concentrating its flavour before pickling.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.

The step that matters

Pour the boiling hot mixture over the cabbage. The liquid must be hot when poured so it penetrates the cabbage and the spices release their aroma into the brine. Pouring it cooler can leave the pickle weaker in flavour and less evenly preserved.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, vinegar, sugar, mace, clove, celery):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, vinegar, sugar, mace, clove, celery. 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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