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Indian Relish

A pickled relish of green tomatoes, cabbage, onions, celery, and peppers flavored with vinegar, sugar, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Indian Relish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

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

  2. Mix the chopped vegetables with ½ cup coarse sea salt.

  3. Let the mixture stand overnight.

  4. Drain the mixture well.

Cook

  1. Chop the celery and cabbage.

  2. Mix all ingredients together.

  3. Boil for 2 hours.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Cabbage + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,645 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

  4. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  5. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 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 and tartness of the relish.
Cabbage
Adds crisp body that holds its texture during long cooking.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the relish and sharpens its flavor.
Sugar
Balances the vinegar's sharpness and adds sweetness.
White mustard seed
Contributes a pungent, sharp flavor to the spiced relish.

The step that matters

Drain the salted mixture well. Salt draws water out of the vegetables. If they are not drained thoroughly, excess liquid dilutes the vinegar and sugar, so the relish may cook watery and lose its balance of flavor and body.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Broccolifits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, onion, celery, pepper, vinegar, sugar, mustard. 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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