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Fried Tomatoes

Fried tomatoes are sliced tomatoes seasoned, coated in egg and flour, then fried until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fried Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the tomatoes across.

  2. Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  3. Dip each slice in beaten egg, then coat with cracker dust or flour.

Fry

  1. Fry in hot butter or lard until golden brown.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body of the dish, with their juice and firm flesh softening as they fry.
Egg
Binds the coating to the tomato slices so the crumb sticks during frying.
Cracker dust or flour
Forms a crisp, golden crust that browns in the hot fat.
Butter or lard
Conducts heat to brown the coating and adds rich flavor.

The step that matters

Fry in hot fat until golden brown. If the fat is not hot enough, the coating absorbs oil and turns greasy instead of crisping. Frying in hot fat seals the crust quickly, so the tomato stays moist inside while the outside browns.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, egg, flour, butter):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, egg, flour, butter. 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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