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Gooseberry Catsup

A sweet and tart sauce made from gooseberries, brown sugar, cloves, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,806 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Gooseberry Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Wash the gooseberries and place them in a porcelain kettle.

  2. Mash the gooseberries, then scald and rub them through a coarse sieve.

Cook and bottle

  1. Add the brown sugar and boil for 3 hours.

  2. Tie the cloves in a bag and add them to the mixture, cooking a little longer.

  3. Adjust the vinegar to taste, then bottle immediately.

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. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  2. Clove + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + clovetop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together17,182 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

Sugar and clove barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 17,182 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Gooseberries
Provide the main fruit body and natural pectin that thickens the ketchup as it cooks.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and bulk, and helps thicken the mixture as it reduces.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and helps preserve the ketchup.
Cloves
Contribute a warm, aromatic spice flavour to the ketchup.

The step that matters

Adjust the vinegar to taste, then bottle immediately. Vinegar is added near the end, after the sugar has concentrated the mixture. Tasting before bottling lets the cook balance sweetness and sharpness, and bottling while hot helps the ketchup keep well.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Peppermintfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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