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Tomato Savce

A spiced tomato and onion sauce with mustard, cloves, pepper, and turmeric, simmered in vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and turmeric match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,279 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Tomato Savce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Sprinkle sliced tomatoes and onions with salt and let them stand overnight.

  2. Drain the tomatoes and onions.

Make the sauce

  1. In a kettle, layer spices and the drained tomatoes and onions alternately.

  2. Cover with vinegar and add turmeric.

  3. Wet the mustard with vinegar before adding it to the kettle.

  4. Boil the mixture for 30 minutes.

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 + turmerictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,279 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Clove + turmerictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,876 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Pepper + turmerictop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Onion + mustardtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Provide the main bulk and tangy body of the sauce as they cook down.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and body that softens during long simmering.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the tomatoes and onions, concentrating flavour and firming texture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and helps preserve the sauce.
Yellow mustard seed
Contributes pungent, sharp flavour that mellows during boiling.

The step that matters

Wet the mustard with vinegar before adding it to the kettle. Dry mustard powder or seed releases its pungent compounds only when moistened, and adding it dry can leave the sauce with uneven, harsh or muted flavour.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, mustard, pepper, clove, vinegar, turmeric):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, mustard, pepper, clove, vinegar, turmeric. 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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