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Sauce

Mushroom Catsup

A mushroom condiment made by crushing mushrooms, salting, and steeping in liquor with cloves, ginger, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Goff, May Perrin, [from old catalog] ed · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Mushroom Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Take the full grown mushrooms; wipe them clean and crush them with your hands; throw in a handful of salt with every peck of mushrooms and let them stand all night.

  2. Strain through a sieve and press out all the juice.

Season and boil

  1. To every gallon of liquor put cloves, Jamaica ginger and black pepper, one ounce of each, and half pound of salt.

  2. Set it on a slow fire and let it boil until half the liquor is wasted.

Bottle

  1. Then put into an earthen vessel; when cold bottle it.

By Goff, May Perrin, [from old catalog] ed. 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. See the original page.

Explore the science

What each ingredient does

Mushrooms (in the method)
Form the bulk of the ketchup and release the flavourful liquor that becomes the base.
Salt
Draws juice out of the mushrooms overnight and preserves the finished ketchup.
Black pepper (in the method)
Adds sharp, warm spice that gives the ketchup its pungency.
Cloves (in the method)
Contribute a warm, aromatic spice note to the liquor.
Jamaica ginger (in the method)
Adds a fresh, peppery aroma that rounds out the spices.

The step that matters

Boiling down the liquor. Boiling slowly over a gentle fire concentrates the liquor and deepens its flavour. Boiling too hard or too long can scorch it or make it overly salty and bitter, so the reduction must be watched closely.

“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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