Name: To Prepare Horseradish for Winter
Ingredients: 1 coffee cup grated horseradish; 2 tablespoons white sugar; ½ teaspoon salt; 1½ pints cold vinegar

Why it works: Horseradish and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,609 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

To Prepare Horseradish for Winter

Ingredients

1 coffee cup grated horseradish
2 tablespoons white sugar
½ teaspoon salt
1½ pints cold vinegar

Directions

Mix the grated horseradish, sugar, salt, and cold vinegar in a bowl.
Bottle the mixture and seal it for storage.

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.

Horseradish + vinegartop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,609 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,806 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Coffee + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,344 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Coffee + vinegartop 25% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together271 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Horseradish + sugartop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,314 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Grated horseradish: Provides the sharp, pungent heat that defines the relish.
Cold vinegar: Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the relish.
White sugar: Balances the sharpness of the horseradish and vinegar with sweetness.