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Chili Sauce

A tomato-based sauce with peppers, onions, spices, sugar, and vinegar, simmered for hours.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Chili Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Scald and peel the tomatoes.

  2. Chop the red peppers and onions finely, then mix them with the tomatoes.

Cook

  1. Add the brown sugar, salt, ground cloves, allspice, white mustard seed, celery seed, and ginger to the mixture.

  2. Pour in the vinegar and boil everything together for 5 hours.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mustard + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,169 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Allspice + mustardtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  4. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Form the bulk of the sauce and provide its body and moisture as they cook down.
Red peppers
Add bulk, mild sweetness and fresh pepper flavour to the sauce.
Onions
Contribute savoury depth and aroma that builds during long simmering.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the acidity of the vinegar and tomatoes.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that sharpens flavour and helps preserve the sauce.

The step that matters

Boil everything together for 5 hours. A long, steady boil lets water evaporate so the sauce thickens and the flavours meld. Too little heat or time leaves it thin and sharp, while overcooking can scorch the sugar on the bottom of the pot, so it needs regular stirring.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, sugar, clove, allspice, mustard, celery):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Horseradishfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, sugar, clove, allspice, mustard, celery. 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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