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Pickles in Olive Oil

Pickles made by layering cucumbers with salt, mustard seeds, celery seeds, olive oil, and wine vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and celery 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 ↓

Pickles in Olive Oil

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cucumbers

  1. Layer sliced cucumbers and salt in a jar, using 1 cup of salt for all.

  2. Soak overnight, then drain in a colander the next morning.

  3. Do not peel the cucumbers.

Layer and pickle

  1. Add a layer of cucumbers, a few black and white mustard seeds, and celery seeds to the jar.

  2. Pour 1 tablespoon of olive oil over the layer and repeat until the jar is full.

  3. Top with 4 tablespoons of olive oil and cover with wine vinegar.

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 + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 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. Cucumber + olivetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyl acetate (fruit).

  4. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Mustard + olivetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Sliced cucumbers
Form the bulk of the pickle and release moisture that the salt draws out.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the cucumbers, firming them and seasoning the pickle.
Olive oil
Adds richness and fat, coating the layers and sealing the top of the jar.
Wine vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the pickles their sharp, tangy flavour.
Black and white mustard seeds
Contribute a pungent, sharp aroma and flavour as the pickle sits.

The step that matters

Drain after the overnight soak. Salt draws water out of the cucumbers, so draining off that liquid keeps the pickles crisp and stops the jar from being diluted before the oil and vinegar go in.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, mustard, olive, wine, vinegar):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, mustard, olive, wine, 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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