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Tomato Rarebit

A cheese sauce with tomatoes, garlic, and breadcrumbs served over toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and garlic are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,076 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Tomato Rarebit

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Grate the cheese and mix it with all the other ingredients.

  2. Rub the chafing dish with the clove of garlic.

Cook and serve

  1. Turn the mixture into the pan and stir rapidly until hot and smooth.

  2. Serve immediately on toast, accompanied by cucumber salad and French dressing.

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

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  5. Pepper + garlictop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Soft american cheese
Melts into the sauce to give the rarebit its creamy, smooth body.
Strained tomatoes
Supply the liquid and tomato flavour that thin the melted cheese into a sauce.
Soft white bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and help thicken the mixture so it holds together.

The step that matters

Stir rapidly until hot and smooth. Cheese proteins can tighten and turn grainy or oily if overheated or left unstirred. Constant, gentle stirring over heat keeps the emulsion even and the sauce smooth.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, tomato, pepper, bread, garlic):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Basilfits better
  3. Oreganofits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, tomato, pepper, bread, 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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