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Anchovies, Essence of

A concentrated essence made from pounded anchovies, water, mace, cayenne and vinegar, bottled for keeping.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,415 recipes. The science ↓

Anchovies, Essence of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the anchovies

  1. Pound the anchovies in a mortar until smooth.

  2. Pass the anchovy paste through a fine sieve.

  3. Put the solids that do not pass through the sieve into a stewpan.

Make the essence

  1. Add any liquid from the anchovy bottles, mace, cayenne, and water to the stewpan.

  2. Simmer gently for 1 hour.

  3. Strain the liquid and mix it with the anchovy puree.

  4. Return the mixture to the stewpan and bring to a boil.

  5. Add the vinegar.

  6. Simmer very gently for 10 minutes longer.

  7. Let the mixture cool.

Bottle and store

  1. Pour into small bottles.

  2. Cork the bottles securely.

  3. Cover the corks with melted wax.

  4. Store in a cool, dry place.

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 + macetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,415 recipes

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

What each ingredient does

Anchovies
Provide the main savory flavor and salty depth of the essence.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and helps preserve the essence.
Ground mace
Adds a warm, aromatic spice note to the anchovy flavor.
Cayenne
Adds gentle heat that sharpens the savory anchovy flavor.

The step that matters

Simmer gently rather than boiling. Gentle simmering extracts flavor from the anchovies without breaking them down harshly or making the liquid cloudy and bitter. Adding the vinegar late and simmering only briefly keeps its sharp notes fresh instead of cooking them off.

“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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