Name: Maniere De Faire Les Cornichons
Ingredients: gherkin cucumbers; garlic; sea fennel; tarragon; long pepper; vinegar

Why it works: Fennel and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 134 recipes. Both carry 4-methoxybenzaldehyde, which smells sweet, anise. The science ↓

Maniere De Faire Les Cornichons

Ingredients

Directions

Wash the gherkins thoroughly in fresh water to remove any down.
Place them in an earthen pot with garlic, sea fennel, tarragon, and long pepper.
Heat the vinegar without boiling it and pour it over the gherkins.
Cover the pot and let it sit for 2-3 days.
Afterward, pour off the vinegar, boil and skim it, then pour it back over the gherkins.
Repeat this process two more times, boiling and skimming the vinegar each time.
On the third boil, add the gherkins back to the vinegar and heat until they tremble, but do not boil.
Quickly remove from heat and transfer the gherkins into jars.

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.

Fennel + tarragontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together134 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).
Cucumber + tarragontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together274 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Cucumber + garlictop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,556 recipes

Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Tarragon + peppertop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,399 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Fennel + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,216 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

Swap the garlic

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, fennel, tarragon, pepper, vinegar):

Dillfits better
Parsleyfits better
Thymefits better
Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, fennel, tarragon, pepper, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.