Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓
Chili Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Scald and skin the tomatoes.
Run the tomatoes, onions, and peppers through a coarse plate of a chopping machine.
Add the chopped ingredients to a kettle with 10 gallons of water.
Cook and bottle
Cook until the sauce reaches the desired density, using your judgment.
If not using benzoate, mix 6 pints of acetic acid with 6 gallons of water and add it near the end of cooking.
Fill the sauce into bottles and cork them securely.
Process
Process pints for 50 minutes at 190°F (88°C) and quarts for 65 minutes at the same temperature.
For canning, reduce acetic acid to 4 pints and process No. 10 cans for 1 hour in an open bath or 35 minutes at 245°F (118°C) under pressure.
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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Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together29,058 recipes
Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
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Tomato + garlictop 3% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together14,076 recipes
Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
-
Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,923 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Pepper + garlictop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,090 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,633 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
- Tomatoes
- Provide the main body, liquid and tangy flavor of the sauce.
- Onions
- Add savoury sweetness and aromatic depth as the sauce cooks down.
- Red peppers
- Contribute sweetness, colour and body to the sauce.
- Granulated sugar
- Balances the vinegar's acidity and adds sweetness.
- 80-grain vinegar
- Adds acidity that sharpens flavour and helps preserve the sauce.
- Benzoate of soda
- Acts as a preservative that inhibits spoilage microbes in the sauce.
The step that matters
Adding the acid and processing time and temperature. Acidity and heat together keep the sauce safe for storage. Acetic acid must be added when benzoate is not used, and the sauce must be processed for the stated time at the stated temperature to kill spoilage microbes.
Swap the tomato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, pepper, garlic, sugar, vinegar):
- Mustardfits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Broccolifits better
- Tomatothe original
Fit is the average pairing score against onion, pepper, garlic, sugar, 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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