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Sauce

Geeejt Tomato Sauce

A spiced sauce made from sliced green tomatoes, onions, mustard seed and vinegar, simmered until the tomatoes look clear.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 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 7,874 recipes mention both. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Geeejt Tomato Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Salt and drain

  1. Sprinkle the sliced tomatoes with coarse sea salt and press with a plate.

  2. Let drain for 24 hours.

Layer and simmer

  1. In a porcelain kettle, layer the drained tomatoes with sliced onions and the spice mixture.

  2. Cover with vinegar and simmer for 2 hours, or until the tomatoes look clear.

Final note

  1. Ensure all spices are ground.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Ginger + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Mustard + allspicetop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned 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

Green tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the sauce and become tender and soft as they simmer.
Onions
Add savory sweetness and body that rounds out the sharp tomato flavor.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and helps preserve the sauce.
Mustard seed
Contributes a sharp, pungent bite that stands up to long simmering.
Ground cloves
Add warm, aromatic flavor to the spice mixture.

The step that matters

Simmer until the tomatoes look clear. Salt has drawn water out of the tomatoes, and simmering softens their cell walls so they turn translucent and tender. Stopping too early leaves them firm and cloudy, while the sauce should be checked so it does not overcook.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

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

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Horseradishbetter flavor fit
  3. Shallotbetter flavor fit
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, mustard, clove, pepper, ginger, allspice, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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