Why it works: Tomato and allspice work together. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 670 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓
Tomato-sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the tomatoes
Pour boiling water over the tomatoes to remove the skin.
Chop the tomatoes and place them in a stew-pan.
Cook thoroughly, then strain through a sieve.
Make the sauce
Add butter, salt, and allspice to the strained tomatoes.
Cook slowly in the stew-pan until thickened.
Use sugar instead of pepper if preferred.
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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Tomato + allspicetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together670 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together98,233 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,918 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Allspice + sugartop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,938 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).
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Butter + allspicetop 25% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,325 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Tomatoes
- Form the body of the sauce, providing moisture and acidity that flavour it.
- Butter
- Adds fat for a richer, smoother texture and mouthfeel.
The step that matters
Cook slowly until thickened. Slow cooking lets water evaporate gradually from the tomato pulp, thickening the sauce without scorching it on the bottom of the pan.
Swap the tomato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, allspice, sugar):
- Mustardfits better
- Sweet potatofits better
- Shallotfits better
- Tomatothe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, allspice, 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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