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Green Pickle

A pickled mixture of green fruits and vegetables in a vinegar solution with salt, cayenne pepper, ginger, and white pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,800 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Green Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Make the brine

  1. In a pot, boil 2 quarts of vinegar with ¼ pound of salt, 2 teaspoons of cayenne pepper, 1 ounce of ginger, and 1 ounce of white pepper.

  2. Once well boiled, cool the mixture.

Pickle and store

  1. Pour the cooled vinegar over any freshly gathered green fruits and vegetables you wish to pickle.

  2. Seal the jar tightly.

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. Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

  2. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  3. Ginger + white peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together388 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Pepper + white peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  5. Vinegar + gingertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,126 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the vegetables and gives the pickles their sharp flavour.
Salt
Seasons the brine and draws moisture out of the produce, helping it stay firm.
Cayenne pepper
Adds heat that flavours the brine as it soaks into the produce.
Ginger
Adds a warm, aromatic spice note to the brine.
White pepper
Adds a mild, sharp pungency to the brine.
Freshly gathered green fruits and vegetables
The produce being pickled, which takes on the flavour of the brine as it soaks.

The step that matters

Cool the mixture before pouring. Pouring hot brine over fresh produce would partly cook it and soften its texture, so letting the boiled vinegar cool first keeps the vegetables crisp.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, pepper, ginger. 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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