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Fried Green Tomatoes

A dish of sliced green tomatoes coated in egg and breadcrumbs, fried and topped with a milk gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Fried Green Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Slice the green tomatoes into ⅛‑inch thick slices without peeling them.

  2. Beat the egg yolk with the cold water and season the tomatoes with salt and pepper.

  3. Dip each tomato slice first in the egg mixture, then in the bread crumbs.

Fry and make the gravy

  1. Fry the coated tomato slices in butter until golden brown on both sides.

  2. For the gravy, cream the flour with the butter in a pan until well combined.

  3. Add the boiling milk to the pan, stirring steadily until it thickens.

  4. Stir in the salt and pour the gravy over the fried tomatoes before serving.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Firm, sour flesh that holds its shape when sliced and fried.
Egg yolk
Binds the seasoning and helps the bread crumbs adhere to the tomato slices.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating that browns when fried in butter.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth gravy.
Butter
Fat for frying that adds browning and rich flavour to the coating and gravy.
Milk
Liquid base of the gravy that thickens as it heats with the flour.

The step that matters

Adding the boiling milk to the flour and butter. Stirring steadily as the boiling milk goes in keeps the starch dispersed, so the gravy thickens smoothly without lumps.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, bread, butter, flour, 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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