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Tomato Catsup Without Vinegar

A vinegar‑free tomato ketchup made by boiling and straining tomatoes with spices and onions.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 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 ↓

Tomato Catsup Without Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Scald and peel the tomatoes, then mash them thoroughly.

  2. Season the mashed tomatoes with salt, black pepper, cayenne pepper, mace, allspice, cloves, and minced onions.

Cook and strain

  1. Place the mixture in a porcelain-lined kettle and bring to a boil.

  2. Once cooked, remove from heat and strain through a sieve to remove seeds and spice pieces.

  3. Return the strained mixture to the kettle and boil until thickened to a cream-like consistency.

Bottle

  1. Allow to cool completely, then transfer to clean pint bottles.

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Mace + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 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

Ripe tomatoes
Form the bulk of the sauce and provide its main body and flavor once reduced.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and body to the sauce as they cook down.

The step that matters

Boiling until thickened. Tomato sauce thickens as water evaporates and pectin and solids concentrate. Stopping too early leaves it thin, while overcooking can scorch the sugars and make it bitter, so it needs steady attention near the end.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, allspice, clove, onion):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, allspice, clove, onion. 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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