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Walnut Ketchup

A fermented walnut condiment made with vinegar, spices, anchovies, and port wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Walnut Ketchup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Procure the walnuts when you can easily pierce them with a pin.

  2. Slightly bruise the walnuts and place them in a jar with the salt and vinegar.

Steep

  1. Let them sit for 18 days, stirring daily.

  2. Drain the liquid from the jar.

Cook and bottle

  1. Boil the liquid with the other ingredients for about 30 minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture if desired.

  3. Adjust the flavor with more vinegar or wine to taste.

  4. Bottle the ketchup and seal the corks.

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. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Walnut + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,230 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Clove + peppertop 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

Walnuts
Supply the main nutty, earthy flavor that is drawn into the vinegar during steeping.
Vinegar
Acts as the solvent and sharp acid that extracts flavor from the walnuts and helps preserve the ketchup.
Anchovies
Add savory depth that melts into the liquid during boiling, rounding out the sauce.
Shallots
Contribute mild sweetness and aromatic body to the boiled liquid.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and fruity depth, and can be added to adjust the final flavor.
Ginger
Adds warm, sharp aroma that brightens the spiced flavor of the sauce.

The step that matters

Let them sit for 18 days, stirring daily.. The long steep is when vinegar slowly pulls flavor out of the walnuts. Stirring keeps the bruised nuts evenly in contact with the liquid, so the extraction is uniform rather than patchy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (walnut, vinegar, nutmeg, clove, ginger, pepper, horseradish):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against walnut, vinegar, nutmeg, clove, ginger, pepper, horseradish. 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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