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Chili Sauce

A thickened tomato-based sauce flavored with onions, peppers, sugar, salt, vinegar, apples, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Chili Sauce

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the tomatoes, onions, and red peppers.

Cook

  1. In a large pot, combine all ingredients.

  2. Boil for 4 to 5 hours, removing some liquid from the tomatoes before boiling.

  3. Stir occasionally and ensure it thickens to your desired consistency.

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. Ginger + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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

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

  4. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the bulk and body of the sauce as they break down during long cooking.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens flavour and helps preserve the sauce.
Sugar
Balances the acidity of the vinegar and tomatoes with sweetness.
Onions
Contribute savoury depth and body as they soften into the sauce.
Sour apples
Add pectin and tartness that help the sauce thicken and brighten its flavour.

The step that matters

Removing liquid from the tomatoes before boiling. Tomatoes release a lot of water as they cook. Removing some of it first shortens the time needed to thicken and helps prevent a thin, watery sauce or scorching during the long boil.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, sugar, vinegar, apple, ginger, cinnamon):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Sweet potatofits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, sugar, vinegar, apple, ginger, cinnamon. 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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Tomato 14Green Tomato 4Raw 3Sweet 3 See all 392 →

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