Why it works: Allspice and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,620 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓
Mushroom Catsup
Ingredients
Directions
Salt the mushrooms
Choose fresh, full-grown mushrooms and layer them in a deep pan, sprinkling salt between each layer.
Let the mushrooms sit for a few hours.
Break them up by hand.
Place the mixture in a cool spot for three days, stirring and mashing occasionally to extract juice.
Spice and cook
Measure the liquor without straining.
Add the spices according to the quantity.
Transfer everything to a stone jar.
Cover it tightly.
Place it in a saucepan of boiling water.
Boil for three hours.
Pour the contents into a clean stewpan.
Simmer gently for half an hour.
Strain and bottle
Let it cool overnight in a jug.
Pour off into another jug.
Strain into clean, dry bottles without squeezing the mushrooms.
Add a few drops of brandy to each pint of catsup.
Cork well.
Seal to exclude air.
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.
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Allspice + gingertop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together2,620 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
-
Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,395 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
-
Allspice + macetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,189 recipes
Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
-
Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together6,800 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,580 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
- Mushrooms
- Form the main body of the ketchup, releasing their juice as they are salted and mashed.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws juice out of the mushrooms and helps preserve the mixture.
- Mushroom liquor
- Supplies the extracted juice that forms the liquid base of the ketchup.
- Cayenne pepper
- Adds heat that gives the ketchup its sharp, spicy bite.
- Allspice
- Adds warm, aromatic flavour that rounds out the spice blend.
The step that matters
Straining without squeezing the mushrooms. Pressing the solids pushes through cloudy particles and bitter, murky material, which makes the finished ketchup less clear and less smooth. Letting the liquid drain on its own keeps the bottled ketchup clear.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, pepper, allspice, ginger, brandy):
- Clovefits better
- Cinnamonfits better
- Thymefits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, pepper, allspice, ginger, brandy. 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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