Name: Epicurean Sauce
Ingredients: ½ cup Indian soy; ½ cup Chili vinegar; ½ cup walnut catsup; 1½ cups mushroom catsup; Optional: 1 cup port wine, a few shallots, thin strips of lemon rind

Why it works: Mushroom and shallot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,982 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Epicurean Sauce

Ingredients

½ cup Indian soy
½ cup Chili vinegar
½ cup walnut catsup
1½ cups mushroom catsup
Optional: 1 cup port wine, a few shallots, thin strips of lemon rind

Directions

Make the sauce

Mix the Indian soy, chili vinegar, walnut catsup, and mushroom catsup in a bottle by shaking well.

Serve

Serve the sauce with melted butter and fish, or add it to various gravies.
For a store sauce, add port wine, shallots, and lemon rind.

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.

Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,982 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Shallot + lemontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,523 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Walnut + shallottop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together440 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Port wine + shallottop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together380 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Walnut + lemontop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,149 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Indian soy: Adds salty, savory depth that forms the base flavor of the sauce.
Chili vinegar: Adds acidity and sharpness that brightens the sauce and balances the savory catsups.
Walnut catsup: Contributes rich, concentrated savory flavor to the blend.
Mushroom catsup: Contributes deep umami and savory body to the sauce.

“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.