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Mushroom Ketchup

A preserved sauce made from mushrooms, spices, and alcohol, bottled and aged.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Ginger and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,038 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mushroom Ketchup

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

Extract the juice

  1. Let the mushrooms stand for three days, turning them occasionally with a wooden spoon.

  2. Drain the liquid without pressure.

  3. Simmer the drained liquid in a clean saucepan for 30 minutes.

  4. Strain the liquid.

Season and simmer

  1. Add 1 teaspoon of mace, 1 teaspoon of powdered ginger, and ½ teaspoon of cayenne for each pint.

  2. Simmer for another 30 minutes.

  3. Let the mixture cool completely.

Bottle and seal

  1. Pour the clear liquid into dry quart bottles.

  2. Add 1 dessert spoonful of brandy to each bottle.

  3. Cork the bottles securely.

  4. Seal the bottles to exclude air.

  5. Optionally add a spoonful of Lucca oil to preserve the ketchup.

Prepare the leftover mushrooms

  1. Sprinkle the leftover mushrooms with salt.

  2. Place the salted mushrooms in a cool oven overnight.

  3. Press the mushrooms to extract juice.

  4. Boil the extracted juice with ¼ ounce each of black pepper, Jamaica pepper, cloves, bruised ginger, 3 chopped anchovies, and 1 tablespoon of port.

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. Ginger + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Mace + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Ginger + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

  5. Mushroom + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,663 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Mushrooms
Main body of the ketchup, releasing the flavourful liquid that becomes the sauce.
Brandy
Adds alcohol that helps preserve the bottled ketchup and contributes aroma.
Anchovies
Contribute savoury depth, adding umami richness to the finished sauce.
Port
Adds sweetness and fruity body to the boiled juice.
Cloves
Contribute warm, aromatic spice notes to the sauce.

The step that matters

Seal the bottles to exclude air. Air carries microbes and oxidises flavour, so bottles must be corked securely and sealed so the ketchup keeps well.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, ginger, brandy, pepper, clove):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, ginger, brandy, pepper, clove. 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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