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Scalloped Eggplant

Scalloped eggplant baked with tomato, bread, cayenne, breadcrumbs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Eggplant and tomato work together. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 651 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Scalloped Eggplant

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

  1. Fry the sliced tomatoes until soft.

  2. In a bowl, combine the stale bread, cayenne, and gravy if needed.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a buttered baking dish, layer the bread and eggplant slices alternately.

  2. Season each layer with salt and pepper, dot with butter, and sprinkle with breadcrumbs.

  3. Cover with a plate and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 minutes.

  4. Remove the cover and brown quickly.

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. Eggplant + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together651 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  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. Eggplant + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggplant
Forms the main body of the dish, softening as it bakes into tender layers.
Stale bread
Soaked and squeezed, it absorbs liquid and gives the layers body and a soft, binding texture.
Tomatoes
Fried until soft, they add moisture and a gentle acidity to the layers.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the top brown as it bakes.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, browned topping when baked uncovered.

The step that matters

Remove the cover and brown quickly. Baking covered traps steam and keeps the top pale and soft. Uncovering it for a short, watched browning gives a golden crust without drying the layers beneath.

Swap the eggplant

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, bread, pepper, butter. 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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