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Tomato Cheese

A quick tomato and cheese sauce served hot over toast or crostini.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Tomato Cheese

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the tomato sauce and cheese, mixing well.

  3. Season with pepper, salt, and cayenne.

Serve

  1. When very hot, pour over crostini or pieces of toast.

  2. Serve immediately.

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. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + tomatotop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,896 recipes

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

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Tomato + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked 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

Grated cheese
Melts into the sauce, adding richness and a thick, savory body.
Butter
Melts to form a fat base that carries flavor and gives a smooth mouthfeel.
Tomato sauce
Adds moisture, acidity, and tomato flavor that balances the rich cheese.

The step that matters

Serve immediately, while very hot. Melted cheese thickens and firms as it cools, so the sauce loses its smooth, spreadable texture if it sits. Pouring it while very hot keeps it fluid and glossy on the toast.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cheese, butter, sauce, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits about as well
  3. Tomatothe original
  4. Potatofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against cheese, butter, sauce, pepper. 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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