Name: To Pickle Gherkins
Ingredients: small gherkins; strong salt; water; vine leaves; ginger, sliced; mace; peppercorns; vinegar

Why it works: Ginger and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,152 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

To Pickle Gherkins

Ingredients

Directions

Soak the gherkins in a strong saltwater solution for three days.
Remove the gherkins and dry them with a cloth.
Line the bottom and sides of a preserving pan with vine leaves.
Place the gherkins in the pan and add sliced ginger, mace, and peppercorns.
Cover the gherkins with more vine leaves and place a plate on top to trap steam.
Fill the pan with vinegar and set it by the fire, ensuring it doesn't get too hot.
Watch for the gherkins to turn yellow, then green; do not let them boil.
Once they reach a fine color, transfer them to jars.
If there isn't enough vinegar, boil more and pour it over the gherkins.
Seal the jars with bladder.

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.

Ginger + macetop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,152 recipes

Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).
Ginger + vinegartop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,126 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Mace + vinegartop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,415 recipes