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Basil Ginger Cocktail Sauce

Cocktail sauce made with the wonderful flavors of fresh basil and ginger.

By tastykitchen · From Open Recipes · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sauce and basil work together. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and 701 recipes mention both. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

The recipe

Serves 2
Prep10 min

Ingredients

Directions

Method written by CompKitchen from the ingredient list. Not the original author's method, not kitchen-tested.

  1. Squeeze the juice from the lemon quarter into a small bowl, removing any seeds.

  2. Add the chili sauce, minced ginger, finely chopped fresh basil and prepared horseradish to the bowl.

  3. Stir everything together until evenly combined and no streaks of horseradish remain.

  4. Taste the sauce and adjust the horseradish to your preference, then stir again.

  5. Cover and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes so the flavors blend before serving cold.

By tastykitchen. Recipe from Open Recipes.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Sauce + basiltop 18% of all pairs
    Aroma overlaplow
    Mentioned together701 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Basil + lemontop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,820 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Ginger + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together5,154 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Ginger + basiltop 4% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together308 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Sauce + horseradishtop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together775 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the horseradish

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sauce, ginger, basil, lemon):

  1. Tomatobetter flavor fit
  2. Carrotbetter flavor fit
  3. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  4. Horseradishthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sauce, ginger, basil, lemon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).