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Creamed Tomatoes

Creamed Tomatoes is a dish of sliced tomatoes sautéed in butter, thickened with cream or milk and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

Creamed Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Cut the tomatoes into thick slices.

  2. Sauté the tomatoes in butter for 3-4 minutes until tender.

  3. Mix the hot cream or milk with flour and stir into the tomatoes.

  4. Cook over heat until the sauce thickens, then 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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Cream + flourtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  4. Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,918 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + flourtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,065 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

Tomatoes
Provide the main body and flavour of the dish, softening into the sauce when sautéed.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the tomatoes soften and carry flavour in the pan.
Cream or milk
Supplies liquid and fat that form the creamy base of the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the cream or milk so the sauce becomes smooth and coats the tomatoes.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour mixture into the tomatoes and cooking until it thickens. Flour thickens when heated in liquid, but if it is not stirred well it can form lumps and stay floury. Cooking gently while stirring lets the starch swell evenly into a smooth sauce.

Swap the tomato

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

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

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