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Uncooked Chili Sauce

A raw sauce made from tomatoes, sweet peppers, celery, mustard, vinegar, sugar, and sea salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Uncooked Chili Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Peel and remove seeds from the tomatoes.

  2. Chop the tomatoes finely.

  3. Let the chopped tomatoes drip for 30 minutes.

  4. Add the chopped sweet peppers and celery to the tomatoes.

Combine and seal

  1. Mix in the ground mustard, vinegar, sugar, and coarse sea salt.

  2. Seal the mixture in jars.

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. Celery + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Provide the main body and liquid of the sauce once chopped.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the sauce its sharp flavor and helps preserve it.
Ground mustard
Adds pungent, sharp flavor that balances the sweetness and acidity.
Sweet peppers
Contribute bulk, mild sweetness, and fresh vegetable flavor.
Celery
Adds crisp texture and a fresh, savory vegetable note.

The step that matters

Let the chopped tomatoes drip for 30 minutes. Draining removes excess free liquid from the tomatoes. Without it, the sauce can be watery and dilute the vinegar and seasoning, weakening flavor and texture.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, celery, mustard, vinegar, sugar):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, celery, mustard, vinegar, sugar. 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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