Skip to main content
Main

Mixed Pickles

A pickled mixture of cauliflower, onions, peppers, cucumbers, nasturtiums, and green beans in a vinegar-brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cauliflower and cucumber match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 584 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak cauliflower heads, small onions, peppers, diced cucumbers, nasturtiums, and green beans in salt water until tender.

  2. Drain and let dry.

  3. Pack into wide-mouthed bottles.

Pickle and seal

  1. In a pot, boil cider vinegar with sugar, salt, and mustard.

  2. Pour the hot mixture over the packed pickles.

  3. Seal the bottles carefully.

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. Cauliflower + cucumbertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together584 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Cauliflower + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

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

  4. Cauliflower + green beanstop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together75 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Cucumber + green beanstop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together95 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

Cauliflower heads
Forms the firm, crisp body of the pickle that holds its texture in the brine.
Cider vinegar
Provides the acidity that sharpens flavor and helps keep the pickles preserved.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the vegetables and seasons them during the soak.
Mustard
Adds a sharp, pungent flavor that gives the pickling liquid its character.

The step that matters

Soak in salt water until tender. Salt draws moisture out of the vegetables and firms them, so soaking too long or in too strong a brine can leave them limp, shrunken, or overly salty. Check texture often and rinse before packing.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cauliflower, pepper, cucumber, green beans, sugar, mustard, cider):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cauliflower, pepper, cucumber, green beans, sugar, mustard, cider. 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 mixed pickles recipes

English 3 See all 133 →

You might also like

Green PeasGreen Peas229 recipesGreen Pea SoupGreen Pea Soup181 recipesGreen Corn SoupGreen Corn Soup46 recipesGreen Peas SoupGreen Peas Soup35 recipes