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Barberry Catsup

A fruit-based condiment made from stewed barberries, cranberries, raisins, quince, onions, and spices, simmered into a thick sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Barberry Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Stew barberries with water until well cooked, then strain through a sieve.

  2. In a separate saucepan, stew cranberries, raisins, quince, onions, and water for 30 minutes, then pass through a sieve.

  3. Mix the barberry juice with the cranberry mixture.

Season and finish

  1. Add vinegar, salt, brown sugar, cloves, allspice, black pepper, celery seed, cayenne, cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg.

  2. Boil the mixture for 1 minute.

  3. If too thick, add vinegar or water.

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 + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Quince + clovetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together164 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Raisin + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Barberries
Provide the tart, sour flavour and natural pectin that give the ketchup its body.
Cranberries
Add tartness and body, helping the ketchup thicken as it cooks.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and depth, and helps balance the sourness of the fruit and vinegar.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps preserve the ketchup.
Quince
Adds natural pectin and a fragrant, slightly floral flavour.

The step that matters

Adjusting thickness after boiling. Fruit purées thicken noticeably as they cool, so adding more liquid when it still looks thin is easier to judge than fixing an overly thick batch later. Adding vinegar or water only after a brief boil keeps the flavour balanced.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (raisin, quince, vinegar, sugar, clove, allspice, pepper):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against raisin, quince, vinegar, sugar, clove, allspice, pepper. 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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