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Plum Catsup

A preserved plum condiment made with cloves, cinnamon, mixed spice, and cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Plum Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the plums

  1. Wash the plums and cook them in a small amount of water until soft.

  2. Remove the plums and let them cool.

  3. Mash the plums and press them through a colander.

Make the catsup

  1. Add cloves, cinnamon, and mixed spice to taste, using the suggested amounts.

  2. Mix in the cider vinegar thoroughly.

  3. Cook the mixture for 20 minutes to improve preservation.

  4. Bottle the catsup for use.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Plum + cinnamontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together513 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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

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

  4. Plum + clovetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together446 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Plum + cidertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together87 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Plums
Provide the main body, pulp and fruit flavour of the catsup.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the catsup its tangy flavour and helps preserve it.
Cloves
Add a warm, aromatic spice flavour.
Cinnamon
Adds a sweet, warm aroma and flavour.
Mixed spice
Adds blended warm aromatic flavour to the catsup.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture for 20 minutes. Simmering the acidic fruit and vinegar mixture for the full time reduces its moisture and helps the catsup keep. Stopping early leaves it more watery and less stable in storage.

Swap the plum

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

  1. Applefits better
  2. Quincefits about as well
  3. Plumthe original
  4. Pearfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against clove, cinnamon, cider, vinegar. 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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