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Mushroom Ketchup

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Vinegar and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Mushroom Ketchup

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Prick unripe walnuts with a pin and place them in a strong brine of salt and water.

  2. Change the brine every four days for a total of four or five times.

  3. Remove walnuts from the brine and wipe them dry.

  4. Place walnuts in a jar and pour boiling vinegar over them.

  5. Add pepper, ginger, mustard seed, and other spices to taste.

  6. Once cooled, cover the jar.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Walnut + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together849 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  5. Ginger + mustardtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,456 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

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Sesamefits better
  2. Lentilsfits better
  3. Beansfits better
  4. Walnutthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, pepper, ginger, mustard. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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