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Tomato Catsup

A tomato-based condiment made with tomatoes, vinegar, salt, sugar, and spices, simmered until thick.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove 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 ↓

Tomato Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Wash and chop the ripe tomatoes.

  2. Rub the tomatoes through a sieve to remove skins and seeds.

Cook the ketchup

  1. In a large pot, combine the sieved tomatoes with cider vinegar, salt, brown sugar, mustard, ginger, allspice, cloves, black pepper, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 1-2 hours, stirring occasionally.

  3. Once thickened, pour into sterilized bottles and seal.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Ginger + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mustard + allspicetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Provide the main body, pulp and flavour of the ketchup.
Cider vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the ketchup its tang and helps preserve it.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and depth, balancing the vinegar's sharpness.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the sauce and helps draw out flavour from the tomatoes.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that complements the tomato and vinegar.

The step that matters

Simmering until thickened. Long simmering evaporates water so the tomato pulp concentrates and thickens. Stopping too early leaves a thin sauce, while overcooking can scorch the sugars on the bottom of the pot, so stir occasionally.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cider, vinegar, sugar, mustard, ginger, allspice, clove):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Radishfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cider, vinegar, sugar, mustard, ginger, allspice, 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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