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Piccalilli

Piccalilli is a pickled relish of green tomatoes, onions, peppers, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Piccalilli

Ingredients

Directions

Salt the vegetables

  1. Layer the sliced tomatoes and onions in an earthenware jar, alternating with salt. Let it stand overnight.

  2. In the morning, pour off the liquid that has formed. Add the chopped green peppers and mix well.

Cook and pack

  1. Put the mixture in a preserving pan with vinegar and spices. Cook until soft, then sweeten to taste.

  2. Pack into earthenware or glass jars and store in a cool, dry place.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Cinnamon + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,581 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the pickle and soften during cooking to form the chunky body.
Onions
Add savory flavor and bulk, softening as the mixture cooks down.
Coarse sea salt
Draws liquid out of the sliced vegetables, firming them and concentrating the flavor.
Cider vinegar
Adds the acidity that gives the pickle its sharp tang and helps keep it preserved.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness, added to taste.

The step that matters

Pouring off the liquid after salting. Salt draws a large amount of water out of the vegetables overnight. Removing this liquid before cooking keeps the pickle from becoming watery and helps it thicken and hold its texture.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, cider, clove, cinnamon, mustard, sugar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, cider, clove, cinnamon, mustard, 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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