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Frozen Tomato Salad

A chilled tomato salad made with canned tomatoes, celery, onion, paprika, salt, and whipped cream, set in a mold and frozen.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Frozen Tomato Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Make the tomato base

  1. Combine tomatoes, celery, and onion in a pot.

  2. Cook until soft.

  3. Mash the mixture through a sieve to create a thick puree, about 1 cup.

  4. Once cooled, stir in salt and paprika.

Freeze and serve

  1. Fold in whipped cream.

  2. Pour the mixture into a mold.

  3. Pack it in salt and ice for 3 hours.

  4. Turn out the salad.

  5. Slice and serve on lettuce leaves.

  6. Optionally add Neufchatel balls for garnish.

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. Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  4. Sauce + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Tomato + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,469 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body, flavor and liquid for the puree.
Whipped cream
Adds fat and airy richness, giving the frozen salad a softer, smoother texture.
Celery
Adds a fresh, vegetal aroma and savory flavor to the puree.
Onion
Adds savory depth and aroma to the tomato base.

The step that matters

Pack it in salt and ice for 3 hours. Salt lowers the freezing point of the ice, so the mold chills and freezes evenly. Without enough salt and ice contact, the salad may stay partly liquid or freeze unevenly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, sauce, celery, cream):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, sauce, celery, cream. 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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