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Spanish Hash

A dish of chopped meat, onions, tomatoes, and chilies cooked in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,633 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Spanish Hash

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the chillies

  1. Roast the red chillies in a 400°F (200°C) oven until light brown.

  2. Soak the roasted chillies in a little hot water until the pulp separates from the skins.

  3. Pass the pulp through a colander.

Make the hash

  1. In a frying pan, heat the lard and add the onions and tomatoes; fry until light brown.

  2. Add the chopped meat and red pepper sauce, and season with salt.

  3. Stew for 15 minutes.

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. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  2. Meat + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Meat + tomatotop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,438 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Chopped meat
Forms the main body of the hash and becomes tender during stewing.
Onions
Soften and turn sweet and aromatic as they fry.
Tomatoes
Add moisture and acidity that help form the sauce base.
Red chillies
Provide heat and a deep, roasted flavor once their skins are removed.
Lard
Carries heat evenly into the pan and adds richness and browning.

The step that matters

Frying the onions and tomatoes until light brown. Browning caramelizes the natural sugars and builds deep savory flavor. Stopping too early leaves the base raw and sharp, while frying too long can scorch it and make the hash bitter.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, onion):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, onion. 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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