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Stuffed Tomatoes

Stuffed tomatoes filled with a mushroom, ham, and herb mixture, baked and topped with bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Stuffed 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

  1. Remove the tops from the tomatoes and scoop out the centers without breaking the skin.

  2. Season each tomato with salt and pepper.

Make the filling

  1. In a saucepan, melt 1 oz of butter and add the minced mushrooms, parsley, onion, ham, sweet herbs, salt, and pepper; fry for 6 to 8 minutes.

  2. Fill each tomato with the mushroom mixture and place them in a baking tin with 1 oz of butter.

  3. Cover with buttered paper and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 15 minutes.

Make the sauce

  1. In another saucepan, combine the scooped-out tomato centers, 2 or 3 mushrooms, 1 small onion, 1 tablespoon of minced ham, and 1 oz of butter; fry for 5 minutes.

  2. Add 1 teaspoon of flour, stock, salt, and pepper.

  3. Boil until reduced by half, skim off the fat, and strain through a fine sieve.

  4. Reheat the sauce and pour it around the tomatoes.

Finish and serve

  1. Sprinkle brown bread crumbs on top of each tomato before serving.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Tomato + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,719 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

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

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Hold the filling and cook down into a moist, tender base for the dish.
Mushrooms
Add savory, earthy flavor and moisture to the filling.
Butter
Adds richness and carries flavor while the filling and sauce cook.
Flour
Thickens the sauce so it coats the tomatoes smoothly.
Brown bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping that browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce until reduced by half. Reducing concentrates flavor and thickens the liquid, while skimming removes surface fat so the sauce stays clean and smooth rather than greasy.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, mushroom, ham, parsley, onion, pepper, flour):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, mushroom, ham, parsley, onion, pepper, flour. 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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