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Baked Eggplant

A baked eggplant dish with onion, tomato, butter, and cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Eggplant and tomato work together. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 651 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Baked Eggplant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggplant

  1. Cut and peel the eggplant.

  2. Stew the eggplant in water until tender.

  3. Drain the eggplant.

  4. Mash the eggplant well.

Make the filling

  1. Fry the chopped onion in butter until tender.

  2. Add the canned tomato, cracker crumbs, and mashed eggplant to the skillet.

  3. Cook for a few minutes, seasoning with salt and pepper.

  4. Transfer the mixture to a baking dish.

Bake

  1. Cover with additional cracker crumbs.

  2. Brown in the oven.

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. Eggplant + tomatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together651 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  3. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

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

  4. Eggplant + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Eggplant + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together870 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggplant
Forms the soft, moist body of the dish once stewed and mashed.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the onion and the filling.
Cracker crumbs
Absorb moisture and help bind the mixture, and brown on top in the oven.
Canned tomato
Adds acidity and savory flavor to the filling.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (eggplant, butter, tomato, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Okrafits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against eggplant, butter, tomato, pepper. 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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