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Tomato Jelly

A chilled tomato gelatin set in small molds, served on lettuce leaves with mayonnaise dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and lettuce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,655 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Make the jelly

  1. Heat the tomato juice in a saucepan.

  2. Dissolve the gelatin in ½ cup of cold water.

  3. Strain the heated tomato juice and mix in the dissolved gelatin, salt, and sugar.

  4. Pour the mixture into small molds and refrigerate until set.

Serve

  1. Serve the tomato jelly on lettuce leaves with mayonnaise dressing or on a plate.

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. Tomato + lettucetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,655 recipes

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

  2. Gelatin + sugartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,778 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Gelatin + lettucetop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together128 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Sugar + lettucetop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,486 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Tomato + gelatintop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-nonanal (fatty, waxy).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatin
Forms the gel that sets the tomato juice into a firm jelly.
Tomato juice
Provides the base liquid and the tomato flavor of the jelly.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness to balance the tomato flavor and acidity.

The step that matters

Dissolve the gelatin fully before mixing. Gelatin must be completely dissolved in the cold water and evenly blended into the warm juice; undissolved granules leave soft spots or grainy patches and the jelly may not set evenly.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (gelatin, sugar, lettuce):

  1. Beetrootfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Cucumberfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against gelatin, sugar, lettuce. 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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