Why it works: Mushroom and parmesan cheese are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,199 recipes. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells apple, fatty. The science ↓
Macaroni with Mushrooms and Tomatoes
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the filling
Cook the mushrooms in butter until tender.
Peel and seed the tomatoes, cut them into pieces, and cook in a little butter.
Combine the mushrooms and tomatoes with the demi-glaze sauce and keep warm.
Prepare the macaroni and dish
Boil the macaroni in plenty of slightly salted water for about 20 minutes, then drain without cooling.
Butter a deep dish and sprinkle some grated parmesan cheese on the bottom.
Layer and serve
Layer macaroni, the mushroom and tomato mixture, more cheese, and repeat until all ingredients are used, finishing with cheese on top.
Pour melted butter over the top, cover, and serve very hot.
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.
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Mushroom + parmesan cheesetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,199 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).
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Mushroom + tomatotop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,719 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).
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Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together12,525 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Butter + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,163 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Tomato + parmesan cheesetop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,490 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Mushrooms
- Provide the main bulk and earthy flavour, softening to a tender texture when cooked in butter.
- Tomatoes
- Add moisture and acidity that brightens the rich demi-glaze and butter.
- Demi-glaze sauce
- Supplies concentrated savoury depth and body that coats the macaroni and filling.
- Macaroni
- Forms the starchy base of the layers, absorbing the sauce and holding the dish together.
- Parmesan cheese
- Melts into the layers, adding salty, savoury richness and helping bind them.
The step that matters
Drain the macaroni without cooling it. Hot, unrinsed pasta stays warm and slightly sticky, so the layers bind and the cheese melts into them. Cooled pasta turns firm and clumps, making the layers hard to press together.
Swap the tomato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, butter, sauce, parmesan cheese):
- Tomatothe original
- Asparagusfits about as well
- Shallotfits about as well
- Spinachfits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, butter, sauce, parmesan cheese. 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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