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Mushroom Ketchup

A sauce made from hogs’ liver, spices, vinegar, and sugar coloring.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove 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 Ketchup

Ingredients

Directions

Salt and rest the liver

  1. Wash the hogs’ liver carefully with cold water and cut it into small pieces.

  2. Sprinkle coarse sea salt generously over the liver pieces and place them in a barrel. Store the barrel in a chilled room for 15 days.

  3. After 15 days, wash the liver pieces thoroughly in cold water.

Simmer and strain

  1. Place the liver in a 100‑gallon kettle and cover with water.

  2. Bring to a boil, skim well, and boil very slowly for 12 hours.

  3. Prepare a spice bag with allspice, black pepper, ginger root, chili peppers, and cloves; tie it securely and weigh it down. Add the spice bag to the kettle during boiling.

  4. Before removing the liquid, add white vinegar and sugar coloring, then bring to a boil.

  5. Strain the liquid through a fine strainer and store it in the chilled room until needed.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Allspice + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Hogs’ liver
Forms the body of the ketchup, releasing savory flavor and dissolved protein as it simmers.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the liver and seasons it during the long resting period.
White vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the finished liquid.
Sugar coloring
Adds color and a touch of sweetness to the finished ketchup.
Whole cloves
Contributes warm, aromatic spice flavor extracted during simmering.

The step that matters

Skim well and boil very slowly. Skimming removes foam and impurities that would cloud the liquid and taint flavor. A slow simmer extracts flavor gently, while a hard boil can make the liquid cloudy and break down the liver too harshly.

Swap the ginger

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, vinegar, sugar, allspice, pepper, clove):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, vinegar, sugar, allspice, pepper, 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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