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Macaroni and Tomatoes

A baked macaroni dish with tomatoes, butter, pepper, salt, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Macaroni and Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the macaroni and tomatoes

  1. Boil the macaroni until tender.

  2. Bake the tomatoes with the butter, basting frequently.

  3. Remove the stalks and skins from the tomatoes and mash them into a pulp.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a dish, combine the macaroni, pepper, salt, and tomatoes, tossing lightly to mix.

  2. Sprinkle with bread crumbs and dot with a small amount of butter.

  3. Bake in the oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden 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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  3. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Macaroni
Forms the bulk of the dish and gives it a starchy, filling body.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, helping the tomatoes brown while they bake.
Tomatoes
Supply moisture, acidity and flavour that coat the macaroni.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browned topping when baked.

The step that matters

Baking the tomatoes with butter, basting frequently. Basting keeps the tomatoes moist while their surface dries and caramelises, concentrating flavour; letting them dry out or scorch leaves the sauce bitter and the dish dry.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatothe original
  3. Potatofits about as well
  4. Asparagusfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, bread. 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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