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Feied Tomatoes

Sliced Feejee tomatoes fried and topped with hot cream or rich milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Flour and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30,481 recipes. Both carry acetaldehyde, which smells pungent, ethereal. The science ↓

Feied Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the tomato in half.

  2. Flour the cut side of the tomato.

Cook and serve

  1. Heat a skillet until very hot.

  2. Place the floured side down in the skillet.

  3. Cook until brown on one side, then turn.

  4. Once cooked through, pour hot cream or rich milk over the tomatoes.

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. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  2. Tomato + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Tomato + creamtop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,034 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Feejee tomato
Provides the main body of the dish, softening as it cooks while the cut side browns.
Flour
Coats the cut side so it browns more evenly in the hot skillet.
Hot cream or rich milk
Adds richness and moisture, poured over the cooked tomatoes as a sauce.

The step that matters

Heat a skillet until very hot. A very hot pan sears the floured cut side quickly, building browning and a crust before the tomato releases too much moisture and steams.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, cream):

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, cream. 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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