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Spanish Rice

A rice dish cooked with onions, tomatoes, vegetable stock, herbs, seasoning, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By T. R. Allinson · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Spanish Rice

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Fry the onions and tomatoes in butter until well browned.

  2. Place them with the seasoning into the cold stock.

  3. Add the rice.

  4. Boil slowly for 20 minutes until the rice has absorbed the stock.

  5. Serve with grated cheese over the top.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

272Calories
7 gProtein
1 gFat
60 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Rice1 cup cooked (158g) white206
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Tomato1 medium (123g)22

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

By T. R. Allinson. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. Rice + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  3. Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Absorbs the stock and cooks into the soft, fluffy body of the dish.
Onions
Brown in butter to add sweetness and savoury depth to the base.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and moisture that flavour the liquid as it cooks.
Vegetable stock
Cooks the rice as it simmers and is fully absorbed.

The step that matters

Boil slowly for 20 minutes until the rice has absorbed the stock. Boiling too hard can break the rice and leave it gluey or uneven, while too little heat leaves it hard. A gentle simmer lets the grains absorb the liquid evenly and become tender.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, tomato):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Cucumberfits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, tomato. 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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