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Mustard Pickles

A pickled vegetable mixture of cucumbers, tomatoes, cauliflower, onions, and peppers flavored with mustard, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and cauliflower match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 584 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Mustard Pickles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Soak the tiny cucumbers, sliced cucumbers, green tomatoes, cauliflower, and peppers in a brine made from 2 cups salt and 4 quarts water for 24 hours.

  2. Scald and drain the vegetables.

Make the sauce

  1. Mix the flour, mustard, and sugar, then add the vinegar.

  2. Heat the mixture to boiling and boil until thick and smooth.

Combine and jar

  1. Add the vegetables and boil for 15 minutes.

  2. Put the mixture in jars and process for 30 minutes according to canning directions.

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. Cucumber + cauliflowertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together584 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Cauliflower + mustardtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together687 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

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

  4. Cucumber + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,405 recipes

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

  5. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that defines the pickle and helps preserve the vegetables.
Flour
Thickens the mustard sauce so it becomes smooth and clings to the vegetables.
Mustard
Adds pungent flavor to the sauce, balancing the sweetness and acidity.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard with sweetness.
Cauliflower
Forms the firm, crisp body of the pickle that holds its texture after boiling.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce until thick and smooth. Flour thickens only when it is heated to boiling and stirred, and undercooked flour leaves a pasty, grainy texture. Lumps form if the flour is not blended in fully before the mixture reaches a boil.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cucumber, cauliflower, onion, vinegar, pepper, flour, mustard):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Broccolifits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cucumber, cauliflower, onion, vinegar, pepper, flour, mustard. 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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