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Sauce

Celery Sauce

A tomato-based sauce with celery, onions, sugar, vinegar, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Celery Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the tomatoes, peel them, and cut into pieces.

  2. Chop the onions and celery, then add them to the tomatoes.

Cook and seal

  1. Add the remaining ingredients, tying the spices in cheesecloth, and cook slowly until thick.

  2. Seal the sauce in sterile jars.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Cinnamon + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

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

  5. Celery + allspicetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,422 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body and liquid that the sauce reduces and thickens.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the sauce thicken and darken as it cooks.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and helps preserve the sauce.
Celery
Contributes savoury, vegetal flavour and body to the sauce.
Onions
Add savoury depth and bulk as they soften into the sauce.

The step that matters

Cook slowly until thick. Slow cooking lets water evaporate gradually so the sauce thickens evenly without scorching on the bottom of the pan. Stirring and keeping the heat low helps prevent sugars from burning.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, celery, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, clove, allspice):

  1. Mustardfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, celery, sugar, vinegar, cinnamon, clove, allspice. 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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