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Tamale Pie

A baked dish of cornmeal, vegetables, olives, and shredded veal or chicken.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Tamale Pie

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 the meat

  1. Boil the veal or chicken until cooked.

  2. Shred the cooked veal or chicken.

  3. Make gravy using the meat juice. Add some Spanish pepper to the gravy.

Make the filling

  1. In a large bowl, combine cornmeal, milk, green pepper, tomatoes, corn, Spanish pepper, salt, beaten eggs, onion, and olives.

  2. Pour the mixture into a baking dish.

Bake and serve

  1. Top the mixture with the shredded meat.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until set and golden.

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. Tomato + corntop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,099 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Onion + olivetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Cornmeal
Forms the body of the pie, thickening as it cooks and setting into a firm, sliceable base.
Eggs
Bind the filling and help it set firm when baked.
Milk
Adds moisture and softens the cornmeal so the mixture bakes creamy rather than dry.
Tomatoes
Add moisture and acidity, giving the filling its savory flavor base.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and depth as it softens in the baked filling.
Veal or chicken
Provides savory meat flavor and richness for the topping.

The step that matters

Bake until set and golden. Egg proteins coagulate as they heat, so the filling firms into a sliceable pie. Underbaking leaves it loose and wet, while the golden surface comes from browning as the top dries in the oven.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, pepper, tomato, corn, egg, olive, veal):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, pepper, tomato, corn, egg, olive, veal. 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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