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Spanish Tomatoes

Stuffed tomatoes filled with pork or beef, onion, breadcrumbs, eggs, and spices, baked until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Spanish Tomatoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Remove the pulp and seeds from the tomatoes.

Stuff and bake

  1. Grind the pork or beef and mix with chopped onion, bread crumbs, beaten eggs, sage, salt, and paprika.

  2. Stuff the mixture into the tomatoes.

  3. Sprinkle the tops with bread crumbs and place a small piece of butter on each.

  4. Bake for 20 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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + porktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Pork or beef
Provides the main filling body and savory flavor once cooked through.
Eggs
Bind the filling so it holds together when sliced and served.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and add body to the filling, and brown on top.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma to the meat filling.
Butter
Adds fat that melts over the tops, promoting browning and richness.

The step that matters

Removing the pulp and seeds. Scooping out the pulp leaves a sturdy tomato shell for the filling. Scooping too deeply can puncture the walls, letting juice leak and the filling collapse during baking.

Swap the sage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pork, onion, bread, egg, butter):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pork, onion, bread, egg, butter. 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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