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Sauce

Celery Sauce

A tomato and celery sauce flavored with vinegar, sugar, and mixed spice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Celery Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel the tomatoes and onions.

  2. Chop the celery, pepper, tomatoes, and onions very finely.

Cook

  1. In a large pot, combine the chopped ingredients with vinegar, sugar, and mixed spice.

  2. Boil gently for 3 hours.

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

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

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Celery + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the bulk and body of the sauce as they break down during cooking.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the sauce its sharp, tangy flavour and helps preserve it.
Sugar
Balances the acidity and vinegar with sweetness and adds body to the sauce.
Celery
Contributes its vegetal, savoury flavour and fibrous texture to the sauce.
Onions
Add savoury depth and aromatic flavour as they soften during the long simmer.

The step that matters

Boil gently for 3 hours. A long, gentle simmer lets the vegetables break down and the vinegar mellow, while a hard boil can scorch the sugar and sauce on the bottom of the pot and make it bitter.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, celery, pepper, sugar, vinegar. 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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