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Tomato Butter

A preserved tomato condiment made with tomatoes, sugar, vinegar, lemon, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,592 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Tomato Butter

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a kettle, combine the vinegar, sugar, and spices.

  2. Heat the mixture until hot.

Cook and jar

  1. Add the skinned tomatoes, which have had the water poured off.

  2. Boil everything together until very soft.

  3. Pour into hot, self-sealing jars.

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 + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,592 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  3. Tomato + vinegartop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,063 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

  5. Vinegar + lemontop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,334 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Red tomatoes
Provide the bulk of the butter and its fruity body as they break down during cooking.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and helps thicken the butter into a spreadable texture.
Strong vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the sweetness and sharpens the flavour.
Mixed spices
Contribute aroma and warmth to the finished butter.

The step that matters

Boil until very soft. The tomatoes must cook down fully so they break apart and the mixture thickens into a smooth butter. Under-cooked tomatoes leave lumps and excess liquid, while prolonged boiling of sugar-rich mixtures can scorch at the bottom of the kettle, so stir often.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, vinegar, lemon):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, vinegar, lemon. 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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