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Cheese, Rice, and Tomato

A simple dish of cooked rice mixed with sautéed tomatoes, onions, green peppers, and cheese, served over crackers or toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Rice and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Cheese, Rice, and Tomato

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the vegetables

  1. Cook the tomatoes, onion, and green peppers for 20 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the cooked rice and salt, then stir in the cheese.

  2. Once the cheese is melted, pour the mixture over heated crackers or toast.

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. Rice + tomatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cheese
Melts into the mixture to add richness and a savory, creamy texture.
Tomatoes
Soften during cooking to add moisture and a mildly acidic, fresh flavor.
Cooked rice
Provides the bulk and body of the dish, soaking up the tomato and cheese.
Green peppers
Soften while cooking, adding a slightly sweet, vegetal flavor.
Onion
Softens as it cooks, adding savory aroma and sweetness to the base.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, pepper, cheese, tomato):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Cucumberfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, pepper, cheese, tomato. 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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