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Pork Roasted with Tomatoes

A pork roast braised in a tomato and onion gravy, served over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,485 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Pork Roasted with Tomatoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA brisk oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the pork

  1. Rub the pork with coarse sea salt and black pepper, then dredge with flour.

  2. Pour 2 cups of hot water into the roasting pan and place the pork in a 400°F (200°C) oven.

Roast and add tomatoes

  1. Roast for 2 to 3 hours, basting often.

  2. One hour before serving, peel and mash the tomatoes in a bowl.

  3. Add the chopped onion, parsley, sage, and thyme to the tomatoes.

  4. Skim the fat from the gravy in the roasting pan and pour in the tomato mixture.

  5. Bake for an additional hour.

  6. Serve with a big dish of rice.

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. Sage + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

What each ingredient does

Pork
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through long slow roasting.
Flour
Coats the pork so its surface browns and helps thicken the gravy.
Tomatoes
Add moisture, acidity and body to the gravy as they cook down.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savoury depth as it softens into the sauce.

The step that matters

Skim the fat from the gravy before adding the tomatoes. Excess fat left in the pan can make the sauce greasy and split its texture, so removing it first keeps the gravy smooth and balanced.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, pepper, flour, tomato, parsley, sage, thyme):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, pepper, flour, tomato, parsley, sage, thyme. 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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