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Chili Sauce

A fermented tomato and pepper sauce made with onions, sugar, salt, and vinegar, boiled for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Chili Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine onions, green peppers, tomatoes, sugar, salt, and vinegar in a large pot.

  2. Boil the mixture for 2.5 hours.

  3. Bottle the sauce and seal it.

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. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  2. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the sauce its tang and helps preserve it.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Tomatoes
Provide moisture and body that cook down into the sauce.
Onions
Add savory flavor and bulk that soften and sweeten during the long boil.
Green peppers
Add fresh, slightly bitter vegetable flavor and texture to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boil the mixture for 2.5 hours. The long boil evaporates water and concentrates the flavors and thickness. Too short a boil leaves the sauce thin and less preserved, while a heavy pot left unstirred can scorch the bottom.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Cucumberfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, tomato, 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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