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Tomata Soy

A spiced tomato sauce made by layering tomatoes with salt, boiling, and adding cloves, mace, pepper, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Eliza Leslie · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Tomata Soy

Ingredients

Directions

Salt the tomatoes

  1. Gather the best and ripest tomatoes on a dry day, do not peel them, and cut them into slices.

  2. Strew some salt over the bottom of a tub.

  3. Put the tomatoes in layers in the tub, sprinkling a half pint of salt between each layer.

  4. Repeat until you have added eight quarts or one peck of tomatoes.

  5. Cover the tub and let it set for three days.

Cook and strain

  1. Early in the morning, put the tomatoes into a large porcelain kettle and boil them slowly and steadily until ten at night, frequently mashing and stirring them.

  2. Let the mixture cool.

  3. The next morning, strain and press the mixture through a sieve until no more liquid passes through.

Spice and reduce

  1. Put the strained liquid into a clean kettle with two ounces of cloves, one ounce of mace, two ounces of blade pepper, and two tablespoonfuls of cayenne, all powdered.

  2. Let it boil slowly and steadily all day.

  3. Put it to cool in the evening in a large pan.

  4. Cover it and let it set all night.

Bottle and store

  1. The next day, put it into small bottles, securing the corks by dipping them in melted rosin, and tying leathers over them.

  2. The sauce will keep for years in a cool dry place and may be used for many purposes when fresh tomatoes are not available.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

19Calories
0 gProtein
1 gFat
4 gCarbs

Counts 4 of 5 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Clove1 tsp ground (2g)7
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Macenot in our table0

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

By Eliza Leslie. 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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Mace + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Mace and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 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)
Provide the bulk of the sauce, and their juice becomes the liquid that is boiled down.
Salt
Draws liquid out of the tomatoes and helps preserve them during the three-day rest.
Cloves
Adds warm, aromatic spice flavor to the sauce.
Mace
Adds a delicate, warm aroma that complements the other spices.
Cayenne
Adds heat and sharpness to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boiling the tomatoes slowly for a long time. Long, gentle simmering with frequent stirring evaporates water and concentrates flavor while preventing scorching on the kettle bottom, which would give a burnt taste.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clove, pepper):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clove, 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.

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