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Devilled Tomatoes

A tomato dish with a sauce made from boiled yolks, butter, vinegar, eggs, mustard, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Devilled Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Pound the boiled yolks.

  2. Mix in the butter and seasonings.

  3. Beat the mixture lightly.

  4. Add the vinegar and heat almost to boiling.

  5. Stir in the beaten eggs until the mixture begins to thicken.

  6. Set the mixture in a saucepan of hot water.

Cook and serve

  1. Slice the tomatoes into ½‑inch thick slices.

  2. Add the sliced tomatoes to the sauce.

  3. Cook for 10 minutes.

  4. Serve the tomatoes on a hot dish.

  5. Pour the hot sauce over them.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  4. Tomato + mustardtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,482 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled egg yolks
Form the smooth, rich base of the sauce.
Raw eggs
Thicken the sauce as they set with gentle heat.
Melted butter
Adds fat for a silky, rich texture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the sauce's flavor.
Ripe tomatoes
Provide the main body and fresh, sweet-acidic flavor.

The step that matters

Stir in the beaten eggs until the mixture begins to thicken. Raw egg proteins set when heated gently but curdle if the heat is too high. Keep the sauce below boiling and stir constantly so it thickens smoothly.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, butter, vinegar, sugar, mustard, pepper):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, vinegar, sugar, mustard, 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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