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Cucumber Catsup

A cucumber-based condiment made by grating cucumbers, draining, mixing with vinegar, and seasoning with horseradish, salt, pepper, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and horseradish match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 640 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cucumber Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cucumbers

  1. Grate the cucumbers and place them in a sieve to drain for 4 to 5 hours.

  2. Squeeze the cucumbers through a cloth to extract as much juice as possible.

Make the relish

  1. Measure the drained juice and pour an equal amount of vinegar over the cucumbers.

  2. Discard the drained juice and season the mixture with horseradish, coarse sea salt, black pepper, and spice.

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. Cucumber + horseradishtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together640 recipes

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

  2. Cucumber + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,734 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  3. Horseradish + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,646 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  5. Vinegar + horseradishtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Provide the main bulk and fresh crunch, and release most of their water when grated and drained.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that balances the relish and helps preserve its fresh flavour.
Horseradish
Contributes a sharp, pungent heat that gives the relish its characteristic bite.

The step that matters

Squeezing out the juice. Cucumbers are mostly water. Squeezing them thoroughly through a cloth removes excess liquid, so the relish stays crisp and does not become watery or diluted once the vinegar is added.

Swap the horseradish

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Radishfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Horseradishthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, vinegar, pepper. 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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