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Sauce

Governor’s Sauce

A fermented green tomato sauce with chillies, onions, horseradish, spices, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Governor’s Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Slice the green tomatoes and place them in a deep dish, then sprinkle with salt and let sit overnight.

  2. Drain the tomatoes and place them in a saucepan with chillies, onions, horseradish, brown sugar, cloves, allspice, white pepper, and cayenne pepper.

Cook the sauce

  1. Add enough vinegar to cover the mixture and simmer gently.

  2. Once the tomatoes are soft, transfer everything to small jars.

Cool and store

  1. Allow the sauce to cool.

  2. Seal the jars tightly.

  3. Store the jars for later use.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Horseradish + allspicetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together654 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Onion + horseradishtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Form the bulk of the sauce and soften into a thick, spreadable texture when simmered.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar and spices.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that preserves the sauce and gives it a tangy flavour.
Onions
Add savoury depth and body as they soften during the long simmer.
Coarse sea salt
Draws water out of the sliced tomatoes, firming them before cooking.

The step that matters

Simmering gently until the tomatoes are soft. Simmering slowly lets the tomatoes break down evenly and the flavours meld, while a hard boil can scorch the sugar and leave pieces unevenly cooked.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, onion, horseradish, sugar, clove, allspice, pepper):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, onion, horseradish, sugar, clove, allspice, pepper. 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.

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