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French Pickle

A pickled mixture of green tomatoes, onions, and green peppers in a vinegar and spice brine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

French Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Chop the green tomatoes, onions, and green peppers finely.

  2. Mix the chopped vegetables with 1 cup of coarse sea salt and let it stand overnight.

  3. In the morning, pour off the brine and add 2 quarts of water and 1 quart of vinegar.

  4. Boil the mixture for 20 minutes and then drain it through a colander.

Make the spiced vinegar and finish

  1. In a separate pot, combine 3 pints of vinegar, 1½ lbs of sugar, ¾ lb of white mustard seed, 1 tablespoon of cinnamon, and 1 tablespoon of cloves.

  2. Boil this mixture for 15 minutes and then pour it over the pickled vegetables.

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 + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,581 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 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

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the pickle and absorb the vinegar and spice flavours as they soften.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the vegetables through osmosis, firming them and reducing their moisture before pickling.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves and sharpens the pickle.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness.
White mustard seed
Adds a pungent, sharp flavour to the pickling liquid.

The step that matters

Pouring off the brine before adding fresh water and vinegar. The overnight salt draw leaves the vegetables very salty; discarding the brine and rinsing off the excess salt before boiling in fresh liquid keeps the pickle from tasting harsh. Boiling then softens the vegetables so they absorb the spiced vinegar.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, vinegar, sugar, mustard, cinnamon, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, vinegar, sugar, mustard, cinnamon, 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.

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