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Fried Tomatoes

Fried tomatoes are sliced, seasoned, coated in flour, fried, then topped with a thickened cream sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fried Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Cut the tomatoes into thick slices.

  2. Season the slices with salt, pepper, and a little sugar.

  3. Roll the slices in flour.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry the slices slowly in butter until brown.

  2. Remove the slices to a hot platter.

  3. Pour the cream or milk into the frying pan and boil until it thickens.

  4. Pour the thickened cream 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. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

Firm, ripe tomatoes
Provide the main body of the dish, softening slightly while holding their shape when sliced and fried.
Flour
Forms a coating on the slices that browns in the butter and helps seal in moisture.
Butter
Fat for frying that carries heat evenly and promotes browning on the coated slices.
Cream or rich milk
Reduced in the pan until thick, it forms a rich sauce that adds fat and body.
Sugar
Adds a little sweetness that balances the acidity of the tomatoes and aids browning.

The step that matters

Fry the slices slowly in butter until brown. Low, steady heat lets the floured surface brown evenly while the tomato cooks through. High heat would scorch the flour and leave the centre raw and watery.

Swap the tomato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, sugar, flour, butter, 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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