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Chutney Sauce

A sweet and tangy chutney made with green tomatoes, green peppers, tart apples, onions, raisins, brown sugar, mustard, salt, and cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and cider are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,238 recipes. Both carry 1-octen-3-one, which smells mushroom, metallic. The science ↓

Chutney Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a pot, bring the cider vinegar to a boil for 5 minutes.

  2. Add the green tomatoes, green peppers, tart apples, onions, raisins, brown sugar, mustard, and salt.

  3. Simmer the mixture for 1 hour, stirring occasionally.

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. Apple + cidertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,238 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

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

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 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 bulk of the chutney and tart body that the sugar and vinegar balance.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that preserves the chutney and sharpens the sweet fruit flavours.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps thicken the chutney as it simmers down.
Tart apples
Contribute pectin for body and tartness that cuts through the sugar.
Raisins
Add sweetness and chewy moisture to the finished chutney.

The step that matters

Simmering for 1 hour. Long, gentle simmering lets water evaporate and the pectin in the fruit and tomatoes set the mixture into a thick chutney. Stirring prevents sugars from scorching on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the raisin

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, apple, onion, sugar, mustard, cider):

  1. Plumfits better
  2. Mangofits better
  3. Cherryfits better
  4. Raisinthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, apple, onion, sugar, mustard, cider. 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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