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Tomato Preserves

A preserve made by cooking tomatoes with molasses, optionally flavored with ginger or lemon peel.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and ginger are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,887 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Tomato Preserves

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Pour hot molasses over the tomatoes and let stand for 13 hours.

  2. Boil the mixture until the tomatoes are properly cooked.

  3. Skim out the tomatoes and continue boiling the syrup until thick.

  4. Pour the thick syrup back over the tomatoes and store as preserves.

  5. For flavor, add a tablespoon of ginger tied in cloth or use lemon peel.

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 + gingertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,887 recipes

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

  2. Molasses + sugartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Molasses + gingertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Ginger + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together14,054 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  5. Tomato + sugartop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,667 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ginger and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 14,054 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Ripe tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the preserve and its fruity, tart flavor.
Molasses
Draws moisture out of the tomatoes and thickens into a dark, sweet syrup.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps the syrup thicken and preserve the fruit.

The step that matters

Boiling the syrup until thick. Boiling evaporates water and concentrates the sugars so the syrup sets thick. If it is too thin, the preserves may spoil; if overcooked, they can scorch or turn hard.

Swap the tomato

The recipe marks tomato as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, ginger, sugar):

  1. Sweet potatofits better
  2. Mustardfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, ginger, sugar. 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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