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Stuffed Baked Tomatoes

Baked tomatoes filled with a cabbage, onion, breadcrumb, and sweet cream mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stuffed Baked Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Cut a thin slice from the blossom end of each tomato and scoop out the pulp without breaking the rind.

  3. In a bowl, mix the chopped cabbage, onion, breadcrumbs, and tomato pulp.

  4. Season the mixture with salt, pepper, and sugar, then add the sweet cream and mix well.

Stuff and bake

  1. Fill the tomato shells with the mixture and replace the slices on top.

  2. Place the tomatoes in a buttered baking dish, cut ends up, and add enough water to prevent burning.

  3. Top each tomato with a small lump of butter and bake for about 30 minutes until well done.

  4. Add another bit of butter on each tomato before serving.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Cabbage + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,001 recipes

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

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  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
Hold the filling as shells and release juice that moistens the stuffing as they bake.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb liquid from the cabbage, onion and pulp so the filling holds its shape.
Sweet cream
Adds richness and moisture, softening the filling as it bakes.
Cabbage
Forms the bulk of the filling and becomes tender and mild when baked.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the tops, helping them brown and taste rounded.

The step that matters

Scooping the tomatoes without breaking the rind. The rind is the only container for the filling. A torn shell lets the stuffing leak and the tomato collapse in the oven, so cut and scoop gently.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cabbage, onion, pepper, sugar, cream, butter):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cabbage, onion, pepper, sugar, cream, 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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