Skip to main content
Main

Gheen-tomato Stew

A stew of salted green tomatoes, meat, carrots, and pimento simmered in fat and thickened with cornstarch.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Carrot and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,555 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Gheen-tomato Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and sear

  1. Slice the onion.

  2. Sear the sliced onion in enough fat to prevent sticking.

  3. Add the meat and sear it well.

  4. Add the carrots.

  5. Add the pimento, cut into small pieces.

  6. Add the tomatoes, soaked for two hours and cut into sixths.

Simmer

  1. Add enough boiling water to cover the mixture.

  2. Cook slowly until the vegetables are tender, about two hours.

Thicken and serve

  1. Mix the cornstarch with a little cold water.

  2. Add the cornstarch mixture along with the butter and pepper.

  3. Cook until the mixture thickens.

  4. Serve it around a mound of boiled hominy or hominy grits on a hot platter.

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. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,606 recipes

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

  3. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Onion + tomatotop 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

Green tomatoes
Provide the tart, acidic base flavor that defines the stew.
Meat
Adds savory depth and body through browning and slow cooking.
Cornstarch
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth, glossy stew.
Onion
Softens and sweetens as it sears, building the flavor base.
Carrots
Add natural sweetness and tender texture after long cooking.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture until it thickens. Cornstarch only thickens fully when the liquid reaches a simmer and is held there briefly. Stopping early leaves a thin stew, while overcooking can break down the starch's thickening power.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, meat, butter, carrot, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, meat, butter, carrot, pepper. 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.

You might also like

Meatless Tomato SoupMeatless Tomato Soup23 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipes