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Sauce

Sage Sauce

A simple sauce made from roast pan gravy, sage, ketchup, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Sage Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Make a gravy from the roast pan.

  2. Add 1 teaspoon of powdered sage.

  3. Add 1 tablespoon of tomato ketchup.

  4. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

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. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

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

  3. Sage + tomatotop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together417 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Tomato + ketchuptop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together754 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Ketchup + peppertop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,207 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Gravy from the roast pan
Provides the savory base and body of the sauce.
Powdered sage
Adds the herbal aroma and flavor that defines the sauce.
Tomato ketchup
Adds sweetness and acidity to balance the savory gravy.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sage, ketchup, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sage, ketchup, 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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