Skip to main content
Drink

Chow Chow Pickle

A pickled cabbage and cucumber relish seasoned with mustard, sugar, turmeric, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Mustard and turmeric match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,279 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chow Chow Pickle

Ingredients

Directions

Salt and drain

  1. Finely chop the cabbage and onions, then sprinkle with coarse sea salt and let sit overnight.

  2. The next morning, press out the water from the vegetables.

Cook and bottle

  1. Add the cucumbers, English mustard, sugar, turmeric, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Nearly cover the mixture with apple vinegar and simmer for 1 hour.

  3. Bottle the mixture 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. Mustard + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Cucumber + mustardtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,281 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Cucumber + turmerictop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,102 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Turmeric + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,478 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 pickle and gives it a crisp, crunchy texture.
Onions
Add savoury depth and a sharp bite that mellows during cooking.
Cucumbers
Add moisture and a crisp, fresh texture to the cooked mixture.
Apple vinegar
Provides acidity that gives tang and helps preserve the pickle.
Sugar
Balances the acidity and sharpness with sweetness.
Turmeric
Gives the pickle its characteristic yellow colour and earthy aroma.

The step that matters

Press out the water after salting. Salt draws water out of the cabbage and onions overnight. Pressing out the remaining liquid keeps the vegetables crisp and stops the vinegar mixture from becoming watery and diluted during simmering.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Limefits better
  2. Avocadofits better
  3. Lemonfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, onion, cucumber, mustard, sugar, turmeric, pepper. 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.

You might also like

Raspberry VinegarRaspberry Vinegar214 recipesApple WaterApple Water81 recipesCucumber PicklesCucumber Pickles25 recipesSugar VinegarSugar Vinegar20 recipes