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Mushroom Catsup

A preserved mushroom sauce made by salting, steeping, extracting juice, and boiling with spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice 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 ↓

Mushroom Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Clean the mushrooms by wiping them and cutting off the ends of the stems.

  2. Place the mushrooms in a deep pan and sprinkle salt over each layer.

  3. Let them sit for two days.

  4. Put the mushrooms in a sieve and strain off all the juice.

Make the ketchup

  1. Pour the juice into a preserving kettle.

  2. For every pint of juice, add 12 cloves, 12 allspice berries, 2-3 pieces of mace, and ½ grated nutmeg.

  3. Boil for 15 minutes.

  4. Remove from heat and let it stand for 2-3 days.

  5. Strain the mixture.

Bottle

  1. Bottle for use.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Allspice + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Mushrooms
Provide the main body and savory flavor of the ketchup.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out juice from the mushrooms and preserves the liquid through the salting period.
Cloves
Add warm, aromatic spice flavor to the strained juice.
Allspice berries
Contribute warm, peppery aroma to the spiced liquid.
Mace
Adds delicate, aromatic warmth that complements the mushroom flavor.
Nutmeg
Adds a sweet, warm aroma to the spiced liquid.

The step that matters

Let the salted mushrooms sit for two days. Salt draws water out of the mushrooms by osmosis, creating the juice that becomes the ketchup. Too little salt or too short a rest yields little liquid and weak flavor.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, clove, allspice, nutmeg. 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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