Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓
Minced Meat in Tomatoes
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare the tomatoes
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Cut off the stem end of each tomato and remove the cores and seeds.
Place the tomatoes in a baking pan and dust with salt and pepper.
Add a bit of butter to each tomato and bake until tender but not too soft.
Make the filling
Mix the cooked meat with salt, pepper, and crushed celery seed in a saucepan.
Add a little stock or water and heat until hot.
Fill and serve
Remove the tomatoes from the oven and fill them with the meat mixture.
Top each filled tomato with a tablespoon of tomato sauce and serve.
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.
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Tomato + celerytop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,377 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together16,012 recipes
Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
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Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,923 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together15,338 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Tomato + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together5,469 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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
- Large tomatoes
- Serve as the hollowed shell that holds the filling while softening during baking.
- Cooked meat
- Forms the savory filling that makes up the body of each stuffed tomato.
- Butter
- Adds richness and moisture to the tomatoes as they bake.
- Tomato sauce
- Adds moisture and concentrated tomato flavor on top of each filled tomato.
The step that matters
Bake until tender but not too soft. Tomatoes contain a lot of water, and overbaking breaks down their cell walls so they collapse and lose their shape. Stopping when they are just tender keeps them firm enough to hold the filling.
Swap the celery
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, pepper, butter, meat, sauce):
- Thymefits about as well
- Parsleyfits about as well
- Celerythe original
- Capersfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, pepper, butter, meat, sauce. 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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