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Tomato Soy

A pickled mixture of green tomatoes and green peppers seasoned with salt, cinnamon, cloves, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Tomato Soy

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the green tomatoes and green peppers finely.

  2. Mix in the fine salt thoroughly.

  3. Let the mixture stand for 24 hours.

  4. Drain off the brine.

Spice and pack

  1. Spice with cinnamon and cloves to taste.

  2. Pack the mixture into a jar and cover with hot vinegar that has been boiled with the spices.

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. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Tea + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).

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

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

  5. Pepper + cinnamontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,890 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Green tomatoes
Form the bulk of the pickle and soften slightly as they cure in salt.
Green peppers
Add crisp texture and a mild, fresh bite to the pickle.
Fine salt
Draws moisture out of the vegetables, firming them and creating the brine that is drained off.
Vinegar
Provides the acidity that preserves the pickle and gives it its sharp flavour.

The step that matters

Draining the brine after the 24-hour stand. Salt draws water out of the vegetables over the standing time. Draining off that brine removes excess liquid and salt, so the pickle stays firm and is not overly salty or watery once packed.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tea, pepper, cinnamon, clove, vinegar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tea, pepper, cinnamon, clove, vinegar. 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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