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Tomato Bouillon

A clear tomato broth made by simmering tomatoes, bouillon, onion, bay leaf, cloves, celery seed, peppercorns, and clarified with egg whites and shells.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and celery are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,377 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Tomato Bouillon

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Cook the tomatoes with the bouillon, chopped onion, bay leaf, cloves, celery seed, and peppercorns for 20 minutes.

  2. Strain the mixture and cool it.

Clarify and finish

  1. Clarify the broth using the whites and shells of the eggs.

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 + celerytop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Clove + celerytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

  3. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + clovetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main flavor and body of the broth as they cook down.
Eggs
Whites and shells trap particles as they set, clearing the broth.

The step that matters

Clarify the broth using the egg whites and shells. The cooled broth must be clear before egg whites and shells are added. As the whites heat, they coagulate and trap cloudy particles, which then rise into the shell mass for straining. Stirring too vigorously can break up the raft and leave the broth cloudy.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (tomato, onion, celery, egg):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, onion, celery, egg. 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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