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Escalloped Tomatoes

A baked tomato dish with butter, onions, breadcrumbs, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Escalloped Tomatoes

Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Escalloped 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. Scald, skin, and slice the tomatoes.

  2. Butter a baking dish thoroughly.

Assemble

  1. Layer half the tomatoes in the dish, then add salt, pepper, sugar, and chopped onion.

  2. Sprinkle half the bread crumbs over the first layer.

  3. Add the remaining tomatoes and top with the rest of the bread crumbs.

Bake

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for about 45 minutes.

  2. Halfway through baking, add the cream.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Form the main body of the dish and release juices that moisten the crumbs as they bake.
Bread crumbs
Absorb tomato juice and cream, forming a soft layered texture and a lightly browned top.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, mellowing the acidity of the tomatoes as it bakes.
Butter
Coats the dish and adds fat that helps the crumbs brown.
Onion
Adds savory aroma and flavor that deepens during baking.

The step that matters

Adding the cream halfway through baking. Adding cream too early can let it curdle or separate in the acidic tomato juices under long, high heat. Adding it halfway lets it heat through and set into the dish gently.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, pepper, sugar, onion, bread, cream):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, pepper, sugar, onion, bread, 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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