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Macaroni and Meat

A baked casserole of cold boiled macaroni, seasoned meat, stock, bread crumbs, and melted butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and thyme are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,585 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Macaroni and Meat

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

Assemble

  1. In a pudding dish, layer cold boiled macaroni.

  2. In the center, add chopped meat seasoned with salt, pepper, thyme, and optional liquor from canned tomatoes.

  3. Pour stock or gravy over the meat and macaroni.

  4. Cover with bread crumbs and drizzle with melted butter.

Bake

  1. Bake for 30 minutes.

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. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Thyme + tomatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,370 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  5. Tomato + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 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

Macaroni
Forms the bulk of the dish and absorbs stock as it bakes, giving body to the casserole.
Chopped meat
Provides savory flavor and protein that browns and enriches the bake.
Stock or gravy
Supplies moisture that keeps the pasta and meat tender during baking.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden top layer through browning in the oven.
Melted butter
Adds fat that helps the crumbs brown and enriches the flavor of the top.

Swap the tomato

The recipe marks tomato as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, pepper, thyme, bread, butter):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, pepper, thyme, bread, butter. 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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