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Sauce

Quin Sauce

A sauce made from Port wine, walnut pickle, mushroom ketchup, anchovies, soy sauce, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Ketchup and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,099 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Quin Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Combine Port wine, Walnut pickle, Mushroom ketchup, pounded Anchovies, Soy sauce, and Cayenne pepper in a saucepan.

  2. Simmer gently for 10 minutes.

  3. Strain the mixture and let it cool.

Bottle and store

  1. Pour into bottles, cork well, and seal.

  2. Store in a cool place; it will keep for a considerable time.

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. Ketchup + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Port wine + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together570 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Walnut + mushroomtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together763 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  5. Walnut + peppertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,039 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Port wine
Adds sweetness and fruity depth that balances the savory and salty notes.
Walnut pickle
Contributes a dark, tangy, concentrated flavor that defines the sauce's character.
Mushroom ketchup
Provides concentrated umami savoriness and body to the sauce.
Anchovies
Dissolve during simmering to add deep savory, salty umami without a distinct fishy taste.
Soy sauce
Adds salty, savory umami flavor and color.

The step that matters

Simmer gently for 10 minutes. A gentle simmer lets the anchovies dissolve and the flavors meld without boiling off the liquid too quickly or turning harsh. Cooling before bottling keeps the flavors stable.

Swap the walnut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (port wine, mushroom, ketchup, sauce, pepper):

  1. Walnutthe original
  2. Beansfits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Peasfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against port wine, mushroom, ketchup, sauce, 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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