Why it works: Mace and currant are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,791 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓
To Pickle Cherries
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the cherries
Leave about an inch of stalks on the cherries and place them in a jar.
Cover the cherries with cold vinegar and let them stand for three weeks.
Make and add the pickle
Pour off two-thirds of the vinegar and replace it with fresh vinegar.
Drain the cherries and boil the vinegar with coriander seed, mace, cayenne or white peppercorns, and bruised cochineals tied in muslin.
Let the pickle cool completely before adding it to the cherries.
After a month, the cherries will be ready to use.
Make the syrup
To make syrup, boil the poured‑off vinegar with 1 pound of sugar per pint, optionally infusing with fresh raspberries, cherries, or currants for 3‑4 days.
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.
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Mace + curranttop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,791 recipes
Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
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Vinegar + curranttop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together693 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,806 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
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Vinegar + coriandertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,829 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
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Coriander + macetop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together281 recipes
Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cherries
- Form the main fruit that is preserved and firm enough to hold their shape in the pickle.
- Cold vinegar
- Provides acidity that sharpens the flavour and preserves the fruit in the pickle.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness to the syrup and balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
- Cochineal
- Contributes a natural red colour to the pickling liquid.
The step that matters
Cool the pickle completely before adding it to the cherries. Adding hot pickle would cook the cherries and soften their flesh, leaving them mushy rather than firm and intact.
Swap the currant
The recipe marks currant as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, coriander, mace, sugar):
- Limefits better
- Lemonfits better
- Mangofits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, coriander, mace, sugar. 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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