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Baked Tomatoes

Baked tomatoes stuffed with ham, breadcrumbs, parsley, and spices, then baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Baked Tomatoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Cut a slice off the stem ends of the tomatoes and scoop out the seeds.

  3. In a bowl, mix the meat, 2 tablespoons of bread crumbs, parsley, salt, and cayenne.

Fill and bake

  1. Fill the tomatoes with the mixture, heaping it in the center. Sprinkle the remaining bread crumbs on top.

  2. Place the tomatoes in a baking pan and baste with melted butter.

  3. Bake for 30 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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Tomato + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,398 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the hollow shell that holds the filling and softens into a juicy base as it bakes.
Ham or meat
Supplies the savory, substantial filling that gives the dish its body.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and form a light, slightly crisp topping that browns in the oven.
Melted butter
Adds fat that helps the crumb topping brown and carries flavor across the tomato surface.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, bread, parsley, pepper, butter):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, bread, parsley, pepper, butter. 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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