Skip to main content
Main

Tomato Beef

A beef stew with tomatoes, salt, clove, butter, and optional onion and tomato catsup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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

  1. Stew the beef until tender.

  2. Add the tomatoes, salt, and clove.

  3. Just before serving, stir in a little butter.

  4. If desired, add the tomato catsup and chopped onion.

  5. 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
Provides the main body and meaty substance of the stew as it becomes tender.
Tomatoes
Supply acidity and a fresh tomato base that gives the stew its flavor.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the finished stew.
Tomato catsup
Adds concentrated tomato flavor and a touch of sweetness and acidity.

Swap the onion

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

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

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

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesRoast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipes