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Mixed Pickles

A pickled mixture of cucumbers, onions, cauliflower, and spices in a vinegar brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,536 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mixed Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Wash cucumbers, remove stems, and cut; peel onions; remove leaves from cauliflower and break into pieces.

  2. Cover the vegetables with hot brine made from 16 tablespoons of salt dissolved in 1 quart of water; let stand overnight, then drain.

Make the pickling liquid

  1. Heat the vinegar in a pot; add sugar, red pepper strips, and spices tied in cheesecloth.

  2. Boil the mixture for 10 minutes, then pour it over the drained vegetables.

Pack and seal

  1. Pack the vegetables into sterile bottles and seal.

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. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cucumber + cauliflowertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together584 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Cauliflower + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together105 recipes

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

  5. Cucumber + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together501 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Provide the main crisp, firm body of the pickle.
Salt
Draws water out of the vegetables so they stay crisp and firm in the brine.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the pickles and gives them their sharp flavor.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
Cauliflower
Adds bulk and a firm, crunchy texture once brined.

The step that matters

Draining after the overnight brine. Salt draws water out of the vegetables; draining them thoroughly before adding the hot vinegar keeps the liquid from diluting and the pickles from going soft and watery.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, cauliflower, vinegar, sugar, pepper, cinnamon, allspice):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Radishfits better
  3. Horseradishfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, cauliflower, vinegar, sugar, pepper, cinnamon, allspice. 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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