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Dill Pickles

Pickled cucumbers preserved with dill, red peppers, black pepper, bay leaves, salt, alum, and cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and dill match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 530 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Dill Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cucumbers

  1. Wash the cucumbers and cover them with cold water overnight.

  2. Drain and wipe the cucumbers dry.

Pack the jars

  1. Pack the cucumbers closely in stone jars, adding fresh dill between layers.

  2. To each half-gallon jar, add 2 small red peppers, 1 teaspoon black pepper, and 2 bay leaves.

Make the brine and seal

  1. In a pot, combine 6 quarts of water, 1 lb rock salt, and 1 teaspoon alum.

  2. Heat the mixture to boiling.

  3. Add 1 quart of pure cider vinegar to the boiling mixture.

  4. Pour the mixture over the pickles, covering them well.

  5. Seal the jars tightly while hot.

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. Cucumber + dilltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together530 recipes

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

  2. Dill + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,630 recipes

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

  3. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  4. Cucumber + vinegartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,734 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  5. Dill + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together659 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Medium sized cucumbers
Form the pickles themselves, so their firm flesh becomes crisp when cured in brine.
Rock salt
Draws water out of the cucumbers and seasons the brine, helping the pickles firm up and keep.
Pure cider vinegar
Adds acidity that sours the brine and helps preserve the pickles.
Alum
Helps the cucumbers stay firm and crisp during pickling.

The step that matters

Sealing the jars tightly while hot. Hot brine and hot jars create a vacuum as they cool, which seals the lid. A loose seal lets air in and can spoil the pickles.

Swap the cucumber

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (dill, pepper, cider, vinegar):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Cucumberthe original
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Cabbagefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against dill, pepper, cider, vinegar. 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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