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Tomato Catsup

A thick tomato-based condiment made by cooking tomatoes with spices, sugar, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,169 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Tomato Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Rub the tomatoes with a damp cloth and cut out the hearts.

  2. Place the tomatoes in a pot with peach leaves, onions, and water.

  3. Boil until soft, about 2 hours, then strain through a coarse sieve.

Make the ketchup

  1. Return the liquid to the pot and add vinegar.

  2. Mix in allspice, black pepper, cayenne pepper, mustard, celery seed (if using), cloves, nutmeg, brown sugar, and salt.

  3. Boil for another 2 hours.

Bottle and store

  1. Once cool, bottle, cork, seal, and store in a cool 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. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Allspice + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body and flavor of the ketchup once cooked down and strained.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and body to the cooked base.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the ketchup its sharp tang and helps preserve it.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the acidity and spice.
Mustard
Contributes sharp, pungent flavor that supports the spice blend.

The step that matters

Boiling the strained tomato mixture with vinegar and spices. Long simmering thickens the sauce by evaporating water and concentrates the flavors. Cooking too briefly leaves it thin and the spices raw-tasting, while the acid helps keep the finished ketchup stable in storage.

Swap the celery

The recipe marks celery as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, peach, onion, vinegar, allspice, pepper, mustard):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Clovefits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, peach, onion, vinegar, allspice, pepper, mustard. 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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