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Tomato Catsup

A thick tomato sauce made by simmering tomatoes with salt, sugar, vinegar, mustard, spices, garlic, and onions.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Tomato Catsup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and chop the tomatoes.

Make the ketchup

  1. Combine tomatoes, salt, sugar, vinegar, mustard, cayenne pepper, black peppercorns, cloves, allspice, garlic, and onions in a large pot.

  2. Simmer the mixture for several hours until thickened.

  3. Strain the mixture through a fine sieve or cheesecloth.

Bottle

  1. Bottle the catsup and seal tightly.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mustard + allspicetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Tomato + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,076 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Form the main body of the sauce and provide its base flavor and liquid.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the acidity of the vinegar and tomatoes.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the ketchup its tang and helps preserve it.
Onions
Contribute savory depth and body as they soften during simmering.
Garlic
Adds pungent aroma that mellows and sweetens during long simmering.

The step that matters

Simmer until thickened. Long simmering evaporates water and concentrates the tomato solids, so the sauce thickens. Stopping too early leaves it thin and watery, while overcooking can scorch the sugars on the bottom of the pot.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Broccolifits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, mustard, pepper, clove, allspice, garlic. 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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