Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓
Cucumber Pickles
Ingredients
Directions
Brine
Wash the cucumbers and place them in a stone jar.
In a pail of water, dissolve 1 pint of salt and pour it over the cucumbers while boiling hot.
Let the cucumbers stand for 24 hours.
Drain the salt water and repeat the process for four consecutive days.
On the fifth day, drain off the salt water and cover the cucumbers with fresh boiling water, letting it stand for another 24 hours.
Pickle
On the sixth day, drain the water and cover the cucumbers with 6 quarts of boiling vinegar mixed with 2 ounces of powdered alum, 1 ounce of celery seed, 2 pounds of light brown sugar, 5 cents worth of cinnamon bark, and 5 cents worth of whole cloves.
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.
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Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together14,189 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Celery + clovetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together4,668 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).
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Celery + cinnamontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,009 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Cucumber + celerytop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,745 recipes
Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
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Cucumber + cinnamontop 8% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together874 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
- Cucumbers
- Provide the crisp-to-tender body that the brine and vinegar gradually transform into pickles.
- Salt
- Draws water out of the cucumbers during the repeated brining, firming their texture.
- Vinegar
- Acidifies the cover liquid, preserving the pickles and giving them their sharp flavor.
- Light brown sugar
- Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with sweetness and depth.
- Powdered alum
- Helps keep the cucumbers firm during the long soak in hot liquid.
The step that matters
Repeated salt brining. Each salt soak must be drained and renewed on schedule. Salt draws water out of the cucumbers and firms them, and leftover brine or a skipped day lets the texture soften unevenly before the vinegar stage.
Swap the celery
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, clove):
- Allspicefits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Cardamomfits better
- Celerythe original
Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, vinegar, sugar, cinnamon, clove. 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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