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Tomato Catsup

A fermented tomato sauce made by simmering tomatoes, spices, and vinegar, then bottling and storing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 ↓

Tomato Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Simmer the sliced tomatoes in a porcelain kettle until soft.

  2. Press the tomatoes through a sieve.

Cook the ketchup

  1. Add salt, mace, black pepper, green peppers, cloves, ground mustard, cinnamon, and celery seed tied in a muslin bag.

  2. Return to the fire and boil for five hours, stirring frequently, especially during the last hour.

  3. Let it stand for twelve hours in a cool place.

  4. Add the cider vinegar and remove the bag of celery seeds.

Bottle and store

  1. Bottle the catsup and seal the corks.

  2. Store in a cool, dark place.

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. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  4. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Form the bulk of the sauce, providing body, flavor, and natural sweetness as they cook down.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the sauce and helps draw moisture out of the tomatoes during long cooking.
Green peppers
Add vegetal, slightly bitter flavor that balances the sweetness of the cooked tomatoes.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavor and helps preserve the sauce.
Ground mustard
Adds pungent, sharp flavor that gives the ketchup its tang.

The step that matters

Long boil with frequent stirring. Boiling for five hours reduces the tomato mixture and concentrates its flavor. Stirring often, especially in the last hour, prevents the thick sauce from scorching on the bottom of the kettle.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, clove, mustard, cinnamon, celery, cider):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, clove, mustard, cinnamon, celery, cider. 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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