Name: Chilli Sauce
Ingredients: 6 ripe chillies; 1/2 teaspoon coarse sea salt; 1 tablespoon vinegar; 1 tablespoon water; squeeze of lime; optional: a little milk

Why it works: Vinegar and lime are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,044 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Chilli Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

Pulp the chillies on a curry stone.
Add the lime juice, salt, vinegar, and water.
Shake well in a bottle and cork.

Serve

Serve with cold meat or fish.
If desired, add a little milk, but note it won't keep as well.

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.

Vinegar + limetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,044 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Lime + milktop 27% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together700 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Vinegar + milktop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,949 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Chillies: Provide the main heat and fresh pepper flavour of the sauce.
Vinegar: Adds sharp acidity that brightens the sauce and balances the chilli.
Lime: Adds fresh citrus acidity and aroma.