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Tomato Beef

A slow‑cooked beef stew with tomatoes, salt, clove, butter, and tomato ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Beef

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the stew

  1. Stew the beef slowly in a pot.

  2. Add the tomatoes, salt, and clove.

  3. Just before serving, stir in the butter and tomato ketchup.

  4. If desired, add the chopped onion.

Serve

  1. Serve warm, and it reheats nicely.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + beeftop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Tomato + clovetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  5. Clove + oniontop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Slow stewing breaks down connective tissue, leaving the meat tender and rich.
Tomatoes
Provide moisture and acidity that build the body of the stew.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rounded mouthfeel and richer flavour.
Tomato ketchup
Adds sweetness, acidity and concentrated tomato flavour.
Ground clove
Contributes a warm, aromatic spice note.

The step that matters

Stew the beef slowly. Gentle, low-heat simmering lets the connective tissue in the beef soften gradually. Rushing with high heat can leave the meat tough and dry, while slow cooking yields a tender texture and a richer, well-blended sauce.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, beef, clove, butter, ketchup):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits about as well
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Shallotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, beef, clove, butter, ketchup. 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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