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To Pickle Lemons, and Limes

A method for pickling lemons and limes with salt, spices, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Turmeric and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,776 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

To Pickle Lemons, and Limes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the lemons

  1. Wipe the lemons clean and make four deep incisions in each, from the stalk to the blossom end, without dividing the fruit.

  2. Stuff the lemons with salt.

  3. Place the salted lemons in a deep dish in a sunny spot for 7 to 10 days, turning and basting them with their own juice often.

  4. Rub the lemons with turmeric.

Pack and pickle

  1. Place the turmeric-rubbed lemons in a stone jar with garlic and onions.

  2. Boil the vinegar, ginger, black pepper, and mustard seed together.

  3. Pour the hot mixture over the lemons.

  4. Cover the jar with a plate and let it sit overnight.

  5. The next day, add the capsicums.

  6. Seal the jar with a skin and thick paper.

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. Turmeric + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Garlic + oniontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Turmeric + clovetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,876 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Lemon + turmerictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,192 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

Lemons
Their salt-cured flesh and rind provide the sour, aromatic base of the pickle.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out juice from the lemons during curing, softening the rind and concentrating flavour.
White wine vinegar
Acidic liquid that preserves the lemons and carries the spices through the jar.
Mustard seed
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that mellows during pickling.
Ginger
Contributes warm, aromatic pungency to the hot pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Salting and sun-curing the lemons. Salt must fully penetrate the cuts and the lemons must be turned and basted over the full 7 to 10 days; otherwise the rind stays bitter and the fruit can spoil before the acid takes hold.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turmeric, garlic, clove, onion, white wine, vinegar, ginger):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Mangofits about as well
  3. Lemonthe original
  4. Plumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against turmeric, garlic, clove, onion, white wine, vinegar, ginger. 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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