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Stuffed Tomatoes

Tomatoes filled with rice, green pepper, and cheese, then baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and rice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,065 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Stuffed Tomatoes

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. Cut a slice off the stem end of the tomatoes and scoop out the insides.

  2. Mix the tomato pulp with the chopped green pepper, rice, salt, and pepper.

  3. Return the mixture to the tomatoes and place a thick slice of cheese on top.

Bake

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until the tomatoes are tender and the cheese is melted.

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 + ricetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

  3. Pepper + ricetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Tomato + cheesetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,896 recipes

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

  5. Rice + cheesetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together942 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

Large firm tomatoes
Hold the filling in a shell that softens and becomes tender as it bakes.
Rice
Absorbs moisture from the pulp and adds body to the filling as it cooks.
Green pepper
Adds a fresh, slightly bitter vegetable flavour and some texture to the filling.
Cheese
Melts over the top, adding richness and a savoury, browned finish.

The step that matters

Bake until the tomatoes are tender. The rice needs enough time in the oven to cook through, and the tomato shell must soften. Underbaking leaves hard rice and firm tomato, while the cheese should melt fully over the top.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, rice, cheese):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatothe original
  3. Mustardfits about as well
  4. Potatofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, rice, cheese. 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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