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Cucumber Vinegar

A fermented cucumber vinegar made by brining cucumbers in boiling vinegar with salt and peppercorns.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,734 recipes. Both carry 2-methylbutyl acetate, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Cucumber Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cucumbers

  1. Wipe the cucumbers.

  2. Slice the cucumbers and place them into a stone jar without peeling.

  3. Pour enough boiling vinegar over the cucumbers to cover them completely.

  4. Add 1 teaspoon of salt and ⅔ teaspoon of peppercorns for every pint and a half of vinegar.

Steep and bottle

  1. Seal the jar.

  2. Let it sit for one to two months, ensuring it is well protected from air.

  3. After the resting period, strain the mixture.

  4. Allow it to settle.

  5. Pour the clear liquid into small, dry bottles and cork them 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.

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 + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,734 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

Young cucumbers
Provide the flavour and aroma that the vinegar steeps out of the slices.
Boiling vinegar
Acts as the liquid base that extracts and carries the cucumber flavour over the resting period.

The step that matters

Sealing the jar and keeping air out during the long rest. Air exposure over one to two months invites spoilage and oxidation, which dull the flavour. A tightly sealed, well protected jar keeps the vinegar clean while the cucumber flavour slowly infuses into it.

“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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