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Tomato Chutney

A preserved tomato chutney made with tomatoes, vinegar, sugar, spices, and dried fruit.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and garlic are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,076 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Tomato Chutney

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Cut the tomatoes and place them in a jar with vinegar and brown sugar.

  2. Cover and bake slowly until it becomes a mash.

Finish and store

  1. Pass the mixture through a sieve and mix with all other ingredients.

  2. Stir the mixture every day for a week.

  3. Bring to a boil to ensure preservation.

  4. Put into small bottles for use.

  5. It is better kept for a few weeks before using.

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. Tomato + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,076 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  2. Mustard + garlictop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  3. Garlic + gingertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,402 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Provide the bulk and body of the chutney once cooked down to a mash.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens flavour and helps preserve the chutney.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and depth, and helps balance the sharp vinegar.
Mustard seed
Contributes a pungent, sharp flavour that mellows during storage.
Sultanas
Add sweetness and chewy texture through the finished chutney.
Garlic
Adds pungent savoury aroma and flavour to the chutney.

The step that matters

Bake slowly until it becomes a mash. Slow cooking breaks the tomatoes down gradually and drives off excess water, so the chutney thickens. Cooking too fast can scorch the sugar and leave the texture watery or uneven.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, sugar, mustard, pepper, garlic, ginger):

  1. Broccolifits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Radishfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, sugar, mustard, pepper, garlic, ginger. 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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