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Baked Tomatoes with Meat Dbessing

Baked tomatoes stuffed with a mixture of finely chopped veal or chicken, sweetbreads, spices, butter, egg, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Baked Tomatoes with Meat Dbessing

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Cut off the stalk end of each tomato.

  2. Scoop out the insides and drain in a small sieve to remove bitter water.

Fill and bake

  1. In a bowl, mix the drained insides with chopped veal or chicken, sweetbreads (if using), pepper, salt, mace, butter, and the raw egg.

  2. Fill each tomato with the mixture.

  3. Cover each filled tomato with bread crumbs.

  4. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about 20 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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Hollowed shells that hold the filling and cook down while baking.
Veal or chicken
Provides the main body of the filling, giving it substance once cooked.
Raw egg
Binds the filling so it holds its shape when baked.
Bread crumbs
Form a cover over the filling that helps it brown lightly in the oven.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches the filling and keeps it moist as it bakes.

The step that matters

Draining the tomato insides. Tomato pulp releases bitter water as it sits. Draining it in a sieve removes that liquid so the filling does not turn watery or taste bitter after baking.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, veal, pepper, butter, egg, bread):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, veal, pepper, butter, egg, bread. 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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