Name: Fried Tomatoes
Ingredients: 3 tablespoons butter; medium sized ripe tomatoes; salt; pepper; sugar (optional); 2 tablespoons flour; 1 pint milk

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Fried Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Fry the tomatoes

Cut the tomatoes in half.
Melt the butter in a pan over medium heat.
Place the tomatoes cut side down in the pan and cover.
Cook for about 10 minutes.
Turn the tomatoes over, season with salt, pepper, and sugar if desired, and cook until tender.
Remove the tomatoes to a platter.

Make the gravy and serve

Add the flour to the pan gravy and mix well.
Gradually add the milk, stirring until blended.
Pour the sauce over the tomatoes and serve.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,923 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together92,116 recipes

Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Butter: Fat that fries the tomatoes and builds the base for the gravy.
Tomatoes: Main ingredient; cooking softens them and brings out their juices into the pan.
Flour: Thickens the pan juices and butter into a smooth gravy as it cooks.
Milk: Liquid that turns the thickened pan drippings into a creamy sauce.

The step that matters

Adding the milk gradually. Adding milk slowly while stirring keeps the flour evenly dispersed, so the sauce becomes smooth instead of lumpy.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, pepper, sugar, flour, milk):

Capsicumfits better
Potatofits better
Sweet potatofits better
Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, sugar, flour, milk. 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.