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Onions and Tomatoes Fried

A quick sauté of sliced onions and tomatoes in butter, optionally with meat drippings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,633 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Onions and Tomatoes Fried

Ingredients

Directions

Fry the onions

  1. Heat a frying pan over medium‑high heat.

  2. Add butter and meat drippings.

  3. Let them get almost smoking hot.

  4. Add the sliced onions.

  5. Fry for about 5 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the chopped tomatoes.

  2. Cook until well done.

  3. Transfer to a covered dish.

  4. Serve.

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

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

  2. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Onion + meattop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Tomato + meattop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,438 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

Onions
Soften and caramelize in the hot fat, giving sweetness and savory browning.
Tomatoes
Add moisture and acidity that mellow as they cook down with the onions.
Butter
Provides fat for frying, carrying flavor and helping the onions brown.

The step that matters

Let the fat get almost smoking hot before adding the onions. Hot fat sears the onion surface so it browns instead of steaming in its own liquid. If the pan is too cool, the onions release moisture and turn soggy and pale.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, butter, meat. 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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