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Tomato Rarebit

A cheese sauce made with butter, flour, cream, tomatoes, baking soda, cheese, eggs, and seasonings, served over toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Tomato Rarebit

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a chafing dish.

  2. Add the flour and gradually pour in the cream, stirring until the mixture thickens.

  3. Mix in the tomatoes combined with baking soda.

Finish and serve

  1. Stir in the cheese, beaten eggs, and season with salt, mustard, and cayenne to taste.

  2. Serve the mixture on toast.

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 + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Butter + cheesetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,805 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,482 recipes

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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
Enriches the base and carries flavor while the flour is cooked into a roux.
Flour
Thickens the cream into a smooth sauce that holds the cheese.
Thin cream
Adds moisture and richness so the sauce stays smooth and pourable.
Stewed and strained tomatoes
Supply acidity and flavor that cut through the richness of the cheese.
Baking soda
Neutralizes the tomato's acidity, reducing curdling and sharpness in the sauce.
Cheese
Melts into the sauce to give savory flavor and body.
Eggs
Thicken the sauce as they set gently with the heat, adding richness.

The step that matters

Adding the eggs. Beaten eggs can scramble if the sauce is too hot when they go in. Stirring them into a warm, not boiling, mixture lets them thicken it smoothly as they gently set.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Horseradishfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, cream, cheese, egg, mustard. 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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