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Red Cabbage

A pickled red cabbage preserved in vinegar with cloves and allspice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Red Cabbage

Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Red Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the cabbage crosswise and place it in an earthen dish.

  2. Sprinkle a handful of coarse sea salt over the cabbage and cover it with another dish.

  3. Let it stand for 24 hours to drain.

  4. Transfer the cabbage to a jar.

Pickle and seal

  1. Boil enough good vinegar to cover the cabbage, adding the cloves and bruised allspice.

  2. Pour the hot vinegar over the cabbage, cover until cool, and then seal the jar tightly.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cabbage + allspicetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together443 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + allspicetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the crisp, pickled body of the dish once salted and covered in vinegar.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the cabbage so it drains and stays crisp rather than watery.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the cabbage and gives it its sharp, tangy flavour.

The step that matters

Draining the cabbage with salt. Salt pulls water out of the cabbage through osmosis. If it is rinsed or drained too little, excess moisture dilutes the hot vinegar and leaves the cabbage soft and less well preserved.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Horseradishfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, clove, allspice. 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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