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Walnuts, Pickled

Pickled walnuts preserved in vinegar and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Walnuts, Pickled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the walnuts

  1. Wipe and prick the walnuts.

  2. Place them in wide-necked bottles or unglazed jars.

  3. Cover the walnuts with cold vinegar.

  4. Seal tightly and let them stand in a cool, dry place for about 4 months.

Pickle

  1. Drain off the vinegar.

  2. Boil fresh vinegar with the seasonings until hot.

  3. Pour the hot vinegar over the walnuts.

  4. Seal tightly and store for about 3 weeks in a cool, dry place.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Allspice + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Walnut + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together553 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Walnut + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,592 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

Green walnuts
Unripe walnuts are the base of the pickle, softening and darkening as they steep in vinegar.
Vinegar
Acid preserves the walnuts and draws out their flavour, giving the pickle its sharp character.
Coarse sea salt
Salt seasons the walnuts and helps draw out their bitterness during the initial soak.
Allspice
Adds warm, aromatic spice that flavours the pickling liquor.

The step that matters

Sealing the walnuts during the long steep. Walnuts must stay fully covered in vinegar and sealed in a cool, dry place for months, so the acid can preserve them and the flavour can develop evenly without spoilage.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Chickpeafits about as well
  2. Walnutthe original
  3. Cashew nutfits about as well
  4. Sesamefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, allspice, clove, 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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