Skip to main content
Main

To Mango Cucumbers

A pickled cucumber recipe with a brine, vinegar, alum, and spice mixture, finished in a sealed can.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

To Mango Cucumbers

Ingredients

Directions

Brine

  1. Brine cucumbers in a strong saltwater solution for 4 days, changing the water once.

  2. Layer the bottom of a brass pan with green kale leaves and place the cucumbers on top.

Green and prepare

  1. Mix half vinegar and half water, add alum, and pour over the cucumbers.

  2. Cover with more kale leaves and heat until almost boiling.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool slightly, then repeat the heating process until cucumbers change color (about 1.5 days).

  4. Remove cucumbers, scoop out loose pulp and seeds, and dry them with a cloth.

Fill and pickle

  1. Fill each cucumber with a mixture of mustard seed, black pepper, Jamaica pepper, nutmeg, cloves, and optional garlic.

  2. Secure the ends with thread and place in a clean can with fresh kale leaves at the bottom.

  3. Boil vinegar with a handful of salt and remaining spices, then pour it hot over the cucumbers, ensuring they are fully covered.

  4. Cover the can with a cloth to retain steam, and seal it with bladder and leather the next day.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

  4. Cucumber + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,556 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Firm green flesh that is brined, then heated in alum to set its color and texture.
Alum
Hardens and firms the cucumber flesh so it stays crisp during heating.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the cucumbers and gives the pickle its sharp flavor.
Mustard seed
Adds pungent, sharp flavor to the filling inside each cucumber.
Cloves
Contributes warm, aromatic spice to the filling and pickling liquid.
Nutmeg
Contributes warm, aromatic spice to the filling and pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Heating until the cucumbers change color. Heating must stop just short of boiling and be repeated gently. Overheating softens the cucumbers and makes them mushy, while too little heat leaves them unchanged and unable to firm.

Swap the garlic

The recipe marks garlic as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, vinegar, ginger, mustard, pepper, nutmeg, clove):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, vinegar, ginger, mustard, pepper, nutmeg, clove. 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.

More pickled cucumbers recipes

Sweet 28and Onions 10Oil 8Green 4 See all 231 →

You might also like

Horseradish SauceHorseradish Sauce23 recipesHorseradish ButterHorseradish Butter6 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes