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Italian Macaroni

A baked macaroni casserole with beef, onions, tomatoes, cheese, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,690 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

Italian Macaroni

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the meat sauce

  1. In a covered kettle, cook the beef and onions on low heat until the beef releases its juices and turns rich brown.

  2. Add the seasoned tomatoes and simmer for 2 to 3 hours.

Assemble and bake

  1. Boil the desired amount of macaroni in water for 20 minutes.

  2. In a pudding dish, layer boiled macaroni, meat mixture, and grated cheese, repeating layers until the dish is full, finishing with cheese on top.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 1 hour or until the top is rich brown.

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. Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  4. Beef + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Provides the meaty base and rich browned flavor of the sauce.
Tomatoes
Supply moisture and acidity that simmer into the sauce.
Macaroni
Forms the starchy body of the casserole, holding the layers together.
Grated cheese
Melts between the layers and browns on top for flavor and color.

The step that matters

Browning the beef and onions. Cooking the beef slowly until it releases its juices and turns rich brown builds the deep flavor of the sauce. Rushing this step on high heat can scorch the bottom of the pan or leave the meat pale and bland.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pork, tomato, pepper, cheese, butter):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Asparagusfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pork, tomato, pepper, cheese, butter. 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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