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To Pickle Mushrooms

A pickled mushroom recipe using vinegar, salt, spices, and wine vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

To Pickle Mushrooms

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Select the smallest wild mushrooms and clean them with a damp cloth dipped in salt.

  2. Soak the mushrooms in spring water mixed with salt, then drain and dry them on a cloth.

Make the pickling liquor

  1. In a pot, combine vinegar, salt, white pepper, ginger, cayenne, mace, and nutmeg (if using).

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil, then add the mushrooms and boil for 6 to 9 minutes until tender.

  3. If mushrooms vary in size, boil larger ones for 2 minutes before adding smaller ones.

Jar and cool

  1. Transfer the mushrooms to small jars or wide-necked bottles, dividing the spices evenly.

  2. Allow to cool completely before sealing.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Ginger + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,324 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Mushroom + white winetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,765 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Ginger + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 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

Mushrooms
Provide the main substance, becoming tender when simmered in the hot pickling liquid.
Pale white wine vinegar
Supplies acidity that preserves the mushrooms and gives the pickle its sharp flavour.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the mushrooms during cleaning and soaking, firming their texture.
Ginger
Adds warm, aromatic flavour to the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Boil the mushrooms by size. Larger mushrooms need extra time to become tender while smaller ones can overcook and turn mushy. Boiling larger ones first for 2 minutes lets all the mushrooms finish evenly in the hot vinegar.

Swap the nutmeg

The recipe marks nutmeg as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, white wine, vinegar, white pepper, ginger, pepper, mace):

  1. Clovefits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, white wine, vinegar, white pepper, ginger, pepper, mace. 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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