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Spearmint Sauce

A mint-based sauce made with vinegar, sugar, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Spearmint and pepper share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 16 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Spearmint Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the mint and remove it from the stems.

  2. Chop the mint finely and place it in a bowl.

  3. Pour enough vinegar over the mint to cover it.

  4. Add 1 tablespoon of sugar, a little salt, and pepper to taste.

Serve

  1. Serve in a glass pitcher or goblet.

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. Spearmint + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  3. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Spearmint + vinegartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together34 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Spearmint + sugartop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

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

What each ingredient does

Fresh spearmint
Provides the main herbal flavor and aroma of the sauce.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the mint and softens its sharpness over time.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with a touch of sweetness.

Swap the spearmint

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Spearmintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, sugar, 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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