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Hound the Table

A baked tomato dish with bread crumbs, ham, herbs, and optional anchovies, olives, capers, mushrooms, and truffles.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Chevalley de Rivaz, Victor · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Hound the Table

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Peel the tomatoes, cut them in halves, empty them, and place them on a dish that will stand the fire, pouring a small quantity of olive oil over them.

  2. Make a mixture of bread crumbs, ham, parsley, basil, marjoram, thyme, finely minced garlic, pepper, and salt. The bread crumbs should be in a proportion of two to one with the ham; the other ingredients in proportions as the cook devises.

  3. Sprinkle the mixture over the tomatoes to almost cover them, and pour a moderate quantity of salad oil over the top.

  4. Bake for a few minutes on a buttered dish, and serve.

  5. Optionally add anchovies, olives, capers, mushrooms, and truffles chopped small, either in addition to or instead of the ham; those who do not like oil may use butter instead.

Prepare the mushrooms

  1. Pick and clean the mushrooms. Make a mixture of pepper, salt, minced parsley, and a little minced shallot. Sprinkle each mushroom with this mixture.

  2. Wrap each mushroom (or groups of mushrooms) in a piece of paper plentifully oiled or buttered. Broil on a gentle clear fire, and serve.

  3. Alternatively, make small paper cases, put mushrooms cut into small pieces with pepper, salt, shallot, parsley, and a piece of butter. Oil the cases, then put on a gridiron or bake in the oven (not too hot). Add a squeeze of lemon at serving. Serve in the cases.

  4. Alternatively, stew mushrooms: parboil mushrooms for a minute or two after cutting into convenient pieces. Throw them in cold water with lemon juice or vinegar. Melt a piece of butter in a saucepan with flour, pepper, and salt to make a sauce blanche. Take mushrooms out of water, dry them, toss them in the saucepan with butter. Moisten with stock or broth, add a little grated nutmeg and a few dried sweet herbs in fine powder. Stew for less than ten minutes. At serving, stir in the...

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

234Calories
0 gProtein
26 gFat
1 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Vegetable1 tbsp (14g)120
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Chevalley de Rivaz, Victor. 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. See the original page.

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. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Sauce + nutmegtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,244 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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 (in the method)
Supply moisture and acidity that soften and flavour the baked topping.
Bread crumbs (in the method)
Absorb oil and juices and form a golden, crisp crust on top.
Mushrooms (in the method)
Provide earthy savoury flavour and moisture that cooks down during stewing or broiling.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the surface brown and taste rounded.
Ham (in the method)
Adds savoury, salty depth to the bread crumb mixture.
Olive oil
Carries flavour and keeps the tomatoes and topping moist while baking.

The step that matters

Stew the mushrooms for less than ten minutes. Mushrooms release water as they cook. Stewing them too long makes them soggy and rubbery, so a short stew keeps their texture and keeps the sauce from thinning.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sauce. 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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