Skip to main content

Tomato Sandwiches

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Anchovy and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,057 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Tomato Sandwiches

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Slice the tomatoes thinly and soak them in oil for 1 hour.

  2. Spread butter on slices of bread.

  3. Layer the soaked tomatoes on the buttered bread.

  4. Season with coarse sea salt, black pepper, and a few drops of anchovy sauce.

  5. Top with another slice of bread and serve.

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. Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Bread + anchovytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,260 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).

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

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Tomatothe original
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Onionfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, pepper, anchovy, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

You might also like