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Molded Tomatoes

Tomatoes stuffed and set in aspic, covered with jelly, served with lettuce wreath and mayonnaise dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and lettuce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,655 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Molded Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the molds

  1. Select small round tomatoes and stuff them without letting the filling project beyond the opening.

  2. Place individual molds on ice and pour in ⅛ inch of clear aspic or chicken aspic; let it set.

Mold the tomatoes

  1. Place a tomato, whole side down, in each mold and add enough jelly to keep the tomato from floating.

  2. Once set, add more jelly to completely cover the tomato.

Serve

  1. Turn each molded tomato onto a serving plate and arrange a wreath of shredded lettuce around it.

  2. Serve with Mayonnaise dressing on the side.

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. Tomato + lettucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,655 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + chickentop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,031 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Chicken + lettucetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,421 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Small round tomatoes
Serve as the main body of the dish, holding the filling and set jelly.
Clear aspic or chicken aspic
Forms a clear, firm gelled layer that holds the tomato in shape.
Jelly
Sets around the tomato to hold it suspended and fully encased.

The step that matters

Adding the tomato to the partly set aspic. If the aspic is still liquid, the tomato floats; if it is fully set, the layers will not bond. Adding jelly to hold the tomato down keeps it submerged until the next layer sets.

Swap the lettuce

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, chicken):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Lettucethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, chicken. 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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