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Spaghetti with Tomatoes

A simple pasta dish with tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and olive are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,539 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Spaghetti with Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the pasta

  1. Cook the spaghetti according to package instructions until al dente.

Make the sauce

  1. In a pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat.

  2. Add minced garlic and sauté until fragrant.

  3. Stir in the tomatoes and cook for a few minutes.

  4. Add the cooked spaghetti and wholemeal flour, mixing well.

Serve

  1. Serve hot.

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 + olivetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,539 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  2. Olive + garlictop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,665 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  3. Tomato + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,076 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Clove + garlictop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,368 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Olive + clovetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,866 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Spaghetti
Forms the bulk of the dish and holds the sauce clinging to its surface.
Tomatoes
Provide the main liquid and bright acidity that make up the sauce.
Olive oil
Carries fat-soluble aroma from the garlic and gives the sauce richness.
Whole meal flour
Starch thickens the tomato liquid so the sauce coats the pasta.
Garlic
Adds pungent aroma that mellows and sweetens as it cooks gently.

The step that matters

Sauté the garlic until fragrant. Garlic burns quickly and turns bitter at high heat, so cook it gently over medium heat only until fragrant and before it browns.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, olive, flour, garlic):

  1. Cuminfits better
  2. Oreganofits better
  3. Basilfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, olive, flour, garlic. 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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