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Sauce

Mint Sauce

A vinegar-based sauce sweetened with powdered sugar and flavored with fresh mint.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Cider and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,431 recipes. Both carry 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol, which smells smoky, clove. The science ↓

Mint Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Sweeten the cider vinegar with powdered sugar and heat gently until dissolved.

  2. Add the chopped mint to the vinegar mixture.

  3. Let the mixture stand until well seasoned.

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. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  2. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  3. Vinegar + minttop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,376 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cider + minttop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together115 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Cider + sugartop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Cider vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that gives the sauce its tang.
Powdered sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Fresh mint
Supplies the aroma and fresh, herbal flavor of the sauce.

The step that matters

Let the mixture stand until well seasoned. Mint flavor and sweetness need time to spread through the vinegar. Rushing this step leaves the sauce tasting sharp and flat, with the mint too faint.

Swap the mint

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Allspicefits better
  3. Peppermintfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cider, 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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