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Macaroni a LA Brignoli

A macaroni dish simmered in a tomato and mushroom powder sauce, finished with Parmesan cheese.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and garlic match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 29,058 recipes. Both carry furaneol, which smells caramel, strawberry. The science ↓

Macaroni a LA Brignoli

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Fry the sliced onion in ½ teaspoon of butter.

  2. Combine the fried onion, tomatoes, parsley, garlic, mushroom powder, and 1 tablespoon of butter in a saucepan.

  3. Stew gently for 2.5 hours.

Cook the macaroni

  1. Cover the macaroni with boiling water.

  2. Add 1 tablespoon of salt.

  3. Cook until tender.

  4. Drain the macaroni.

  5. Place the drained macaroni in cold water.

  6. Drain the macaroni again.

Assemble and serve

  1. Place the drained macaroni in a dish.

  2. Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of Parmesan cheese over the macaroni.

  3. Pour the sauce on top.

  4. Reheat the dish in the oven for a few minutes.

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. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  2. Tomato + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,076 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Parsley + garlictop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,308 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Mushroom + parmesan cheesetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,199 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).

  5. Garlic + mushroomtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,700 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Break down during slow stewing to form the body and flavour of the sauce.
Onion
Fried first to build savoury sweetness that underpins the sauce.
Macaroni
Pasta forms the starchy base that the sauce coats and holds.
Parmesan cheese
Adds salty, savoury depth and browns lightly when reheated on top.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the fried onion and the simmering sauce.

The step that matters

Stew gently for 2.5 hours. Low, gentle heat over a long time lets tomatoes break down and concentrate into a thick sauce without scorching. Too much heat can burn the bottom of the pan and make the sauce taste bitter.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, butter, tomato, parsley, garlic, mushroom, parmesan cheese):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Basilfits better
  3. Oreganofits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, butter, tomato, parsley, garlic, mushroom, parmesan cheese. 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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