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Tomato Catsup--the Best

A thickened tomato sauce made with sugar, onions, cloves, allspice, mustard, salt, pepper, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.) · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,259 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Catsup--the Best

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Put 1 gallon of tomato juice passed through a sieve into a pot.

  2. Add 1½ lbs of brown sugar.

  3. Add 4 large onions chopped very fine.

  4. Add 2 tablespoons ground cloves.

  5. Add 2 of allspice.

  6. Add 1 large box mustard.

  7. Add a great deal of salt and red pepper.

  8. Place on fire and let it boil until it thickens.

  9. Add not quite 1 qt of vinegar just before it is done.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

54Calories
2 gProtein
1 gFat
12 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Cloves1 tsp ground (2g)7
Mustard1 tsp (5g) yellow3

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.). Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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

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. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Clove + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,829 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Clove + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomato juice
Forms the liquid base that cooks down into the ketchup's body.
Brown sugar (in the method)
Adds sweetness and helps balance the acidity of the tomatoes and vinegar.
Onions
Add savory flavour and body as they soften during the long boil.
Vinegar (in the method)
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps preserve the ketchup.

The step that matters

Boiling until it thickens. Tomato juice thickens slowly as water evaporates, so it needs a steady boil long enough to reach the right consistency. Adding the vinegar near the end keeps its sharp flavour from cooking off.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, mustard):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, mustard. 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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