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Capsicum or Chili Vinegar

A vinegar infused with red chilies or capsicums and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Capsicum and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,571 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Capsicum or Chili Vinegar

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Pound the red chilies or cayenne pepper.

  2. Steep in 1 pint of vinegar for 2 weeks.

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. Capsicum + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,571 recipes

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

  2. Capsicum + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,160 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Red chilies
Supply the heat and pungent flavor that the vinegar extracts over the steeping period.
Cayenne pepper
Adds concentrated heat and pungency to the infused vinegar.
Vinegar
Acts as the solvent that draws flavor and heat out of the chilies and preserves the mixture.

The step that matters

Pound the chilies before steeping. Breaking the chili flesh and skins exposes more surface area, so the vinegar can extract capsaicin and flavor more evenly during the two-week steep.

“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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