Name: Broiled Tomatoes
Ingredients: 4 medium tomatoes; ½ cup bread crumbs; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt (formerly 'bay salt'); 2 tablespoons butter; 1 teaspoon sugar (optional)

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Broiled Tomatoes

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.

Prepare

Cut the tomatoes into thin slices.
Sprinkle each slice with bread crumbs, pepper, and salt.

Broil and serve

Broil for 8 minutes.
Transfer the sliced tomatoes to a hot dish.
Place the dish in a 400°F (200°C) oven for a few minutes.
Top each slice with small pieces of butter.
Add sugar if desired.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,923 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,013 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together98,233 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes: Juicy flesh softens and releases moisture under heat, while its acidity brightens the dish.
Bread crumbs: Absorb tomato juices and crisp on top under the broiler, giving a browned crust.
Butter: Adds fat and richness, and its milk solids help the top brown.