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Cabbagh Saute with Bacon

A sauté of cabbage cooked with bacon, sugar, vinegar, onion, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,001 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cabbagh Saute with Bacon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Parboil the cabbage until tender, then drain.

Cook and season

  1. In a frying pan, cook the bacon pieces until crispy.

  2. Add the parboiled cabbage to the pan with the bacon.

  3. Stir in the sugar, vinegar, minced onion, and salt.

  4. Heat thoroughly, mixing well before serving.

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. Cabbage + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,001 recipes

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

  2. Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Vinegar + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  4. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Cabbage + sugartop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the bulk of the dish and becomes tender after parboiling and sauteing.
Bacon
Renders fat into the pan and adds savory, crisp flavor to the cabbage.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the cabbage a tangy, sharp flavor.

The step that matters

Heat thoroughly, mixing well before serving. Sugar and vinegar must be fully dissolved and evenly distributed through the cabbage, or the dish will taste unevenly sweet and sour. Thorough heating also ensures the cabbage is hot throughout.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, sugar, vinegar):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, sugar, 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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