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Fried Tomatoes

Tomato slices are coated in flour, fried, then finished with a thickened sauce of flour, milk, and hot water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Fried Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Season the flour with pepper and salt.

  2. Wash and slice the tomatoes into 3 or 4 slices, discarding the ends.

  3. Dip the tomato slices in the flour.

Fry and make the gravy

  1. Fry the slices in lard and butter or drippings until brown, turning carefully.

  2. Leave 4 or 5 pieces in the pan.

  3. Pour in a little hot water.

  4. Add the remaining flour mixed with milk.

  5. Cook until thickened and brown.

  6. Pour over the tomatoes.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Tomato + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,226 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Coats the tomato slices and, mixed with milk, thickens the gravy.
Tomatoes
Main ingredient, softening and browning in the hot fat as they fry.
Lard
Fat for frying that browns the tomato slices.
Butter or drippings
Adds flavor and fat for frying and browning the slices.
Milk
Combines with flour to thicken the pan gravy.

The step that matters

Cook until thickened and brown. Flour mixed with milk thickens as it heats, but it can scorch if the heat is too high. Stirring and moderate heat let the gravy thicken smoothly and brown evenly without burning.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, milk):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, milk. 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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