Skip to main content
Main

Mushroom Ketchup, Another M'ay

A preserved mushroom condiment made by simmering fresh and pickled mushrooms with spices, then bottling and aging.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Shallot and horseradish match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 376 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Mushroom Ketchup, Another M'ay

Ingredients

Directions

Make the ketchup

  1. Place the mushrooms and pickled mushroom skins in a stewpan with salt over low heat.

  2. Allow them to produce liquid, then strain the mixture.

  3. Add shallots, garlic, pepper, ginger, mace, cloves, and bay leaves to the liquid.

  4. Boil slowly and skim off any foam.

Bottle and store

  1. Once cooled, bottle and cork tightly.

  2. After two months, reboil with fresh spices and horseradish to preserve for a year.

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. Shallot + horseradishtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together376 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Shallot + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,000 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked 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

Flap mushrooms
Provide the main body of flavour and liquid as they release their juices with salt.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the mushrooms and helps preserve the liquid.
Shallots
Add savoury depth and a mild sharpness to the liquid.
Garlic
Adds pungent aroma and savoury depth to the ketchup.
Bay leaves
Contribute a subtle herbal aroma as the liquid simmers.

The step that matters

Skimming the foam while boiling slowly. Foam carries impurities and proteins that can cloud the liquid and spoil its clarity and flavour, so skimming keeps the ketchup clean and stable during long storage.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, shallot, clove, garlic, pepper, ginger, horseradish):

  1. Turmericfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, shallot, clove, garlic, pepper, ginger, horseradish. 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.

More mushroom ketchup recipes

Sauce 4 See all 229 →

You might also like

Mushroom SoupMushroom Soup60 recipesHorseradish SauceHorseradish Sauce17 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes