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Casserole of Rice with Tomato Sauce

A baked rice casserole topped with a tomato sauce and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Casserole of Rice with Tomato Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Cook the rice

  1. Boil the rice in hot water with a little salt, shaking occasionally but do not stir, then drain it.

  2. Add milk mixed with the beaten egg, butter, pepper, and salt, then simmer for five minutes.

  3. If the rice hasn't absorbed all the milk, drain it again.

Shape and bake the rice

  1. Shape the rice around the inner edge of a flat dish, smoothing it into a fence shape.

  2. Brush the rice with the beaten egg yolks.

  3. Bake until firm at 400°F (200°C).

Make the tomato filling and assemble

  1. Drain more than half the juice from the tomatoes.

  2. Season with onion, pepper, salt, and sugar, then stew the tomato mixture for twenty minutes.

  3. Stir in butter and bread crumbs, then cook for an additional three to four minutes to thicken.

  4. Pour into the rice hedge.

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. Rice + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Rice + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,374 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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

Rice
Forms the structure of the hedge as its starch sets when cooked and cooled.
Eggs
Bind the milk and rice and set firm during baking, holding the shape together.
Tomatoes
Provide the main moisture and acidity for the sauce that fills the rice hedge.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid from the tomatoes and help thicken the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the sauce a smoother texture and flavour.

The step that matters

Drain the rice well and shape it firmly. Excess liquid in the rice makes the wall weak and prone to slumping. Pressing the rice while it is still warm helps the starch hold it in shape as it cools and sets, so the sauce stays inside the hedge.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, milk, egg, butter, pepper, tomato, sugar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, milk, egg, butter, pepper, tomato, sugar. 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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