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Another Good Receipt for Walnut Catsup

A walnut-based condiment made by steeping walnuts with aromatics, then simmering with anchovies and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Another Good Receipt for Walnut Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the walnuts

  1. Bruise the walnuts in a large marble mortar until broken.

  2. Place the bruised walnuts in a stone jar with the eschalots, garlic, salt, and vinegar.

  3. Let the mixture stand for 10 days, stirring it morning and night.

  4. Strain the liquid from the jar.

Make and bottle the ketchup

  1. Boil the strained liquid for 30 minutes with anchovies, black pepper, cloves, and mace.

  2. Skim the hot mixture.

  3. Strain the mixture again.

  4. Let the strained liquid cool.

  5. Pour the cooled liquid into small dry bottles, avoiding sediment.

  6. Cork the bottles tightly.

  7. Store the bottled catsup in a 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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Walnut + clovetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Garlic + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Green walnuts
Provide the main flavour base, releasing their bitter, astringent juices into the vinegar over days.
Vinegar
Acts as the preserving liquid and extracts flavour from the walnuts and other solids.
Eschalots
Add savoury, pungent aromatic flavour to the liquid.
Anchovies
Contribute a salty, savoury depth that rounds out the sauce.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture and flavour out of the walnuts and aids preservation.

The step that matters

Skim the hot mixture. Skimming during the boil removes foam and impurities that rise to the surface, keeping the finished liquid clearer and less likely to spoil in storage.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (walnut, garlic, vinegar, pepper, clove):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against walnut, garlic, vinegar, pepper, clove. 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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