Name: Shikaree Sauce for Wild Duck
Ingredients: 2 teaspoons pounded white sugar; 2 teaspoons cayenne pepper (or 1 teaspoon if preferred); ⅓ cup claret or port wine; ⅓ cup ketchup; 2 teaspoons essence of anchovies; juice of ½ large lemon; 1 slice of butter

Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Shikaree Sauce for Wild Duck

Ingredients

2 teaspoons pounded white sugar
2 teaspoons cayenne pepper (or 1 teaspoon if preferred)
⅓ cup claret or port wine
⅓ cup ketchup
2 teaspoons essence of anchovies
juice of ½ large lemon
1 slice of butter

Directions

Make the sauce

Mix the sugar and cayenne pepper in a bowl.
Add the claret or port wine, ketchup, essence of anchovies, and lemon juice.
Warm the mixture over low heat.

Serve

Score the breast of the duck and place a slice of butter on top.
Pour the warm sauce over the duck before serving.

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.

Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Sugar + ketchuptop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together260 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Port wine + buttertop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,499 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
Port wine + ketchuptop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together425 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Lemon + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,227 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Claret or port wine: Adds depth and a fruity, tannic backbone to the sauce.
Ketchup: Contributes sweetness and acidity that rounds out the sharp seasonings.
Cayenne pepper: Provides the heat that defines the sauce.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and balances the sweetness.
Butter: Adds fat and richness that carries flavour over the duck.

“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.