Skip to main content
Main

Oohka Gumbo

A tomato-based gumbo with okra, chicken, and optional beans, served over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Tomato and okra work together. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 327 recipes. Both carry damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Oohka Gumbo

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine the tomatoes, okra, and water in a large pot.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Fry the chicken pieces in a skillet until browned and cooked through.

  4. Add the fried chicken to the pot with the tomatoes and okra.

Simmer and serve

  1. Season the gumbo with salt and pepper.

  2. If available, add corn and Lima beans.

  3. Let the mixture simmer gently for several hours.

  4. Serve each bowl with a tablespoon of boiled rice and a sprinkle of chopped green pepper.

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 + okratop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together327 recipes

    Shared aroma: damascenone (apple, rose).

  2. Chicken + ricetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,769 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).

  3. Okra + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together250 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).

  4. Tomato + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

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

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

Ripe tomatoes
Break down into the liquid to form the body and tangy flavor of the gumbo.
Okra
Releases its natural mucilage during simmering, thickening the gumbo and giving it body.
Chicken
Browning adds savory flavor to the pieces before they join the simmering pot.

The step that matters

Let the mixture simmer gently for several hours. Long, gentle simmering lets the okra release its thickening mucilage and lets the flavors meld. A hard boil can break the tomatoes down unevenly and scorch the bottom of the pot.

Swap the okra

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Okrathe original
  4. Carrotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, chicken, pepper, rice. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesChicken BrothChicken Broth257 recipesChicken SoupChicken Soup156 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipes