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Cold and Hot Slaws

A cabbage slaw dressed with a hot butter, vinegar, and cayenne sauce served cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,924 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Cold and Hot Slaws

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and strain the cabbage, then cut off the stalk and shave it into very small strips.

  2. Place the cabbage in a deep dish.

Make and serve

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter with the water, vinegar, salt, and cayenne, then bring to a boil.

  2. Pour the hot dressing over the cabbage and serve cold.

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. Cabbage + vinegartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

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

  2. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  3. Cabbage + buttertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,397 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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 dish and provides the crisp, fibrous texture.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries the flavour of the dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the dressing and balances the butter.

The step that matters

Bringing the dressing to a boil. Butter, water and vinegar must be fully melted and combined before pouring. If the mixture separates or is only lukewarm, the fat will not coat the cabbage evenly and the dressing will taste uneven.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Onionfits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, 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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