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Stewed Tomatoes

A dish of tomatoes simmered with onions, sugar, butter, flour, salt, pepper, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Stewed Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tomatoes

  1. Scald the tomatoes in hot water, then cool and remove the skins.

  2. Drain the tomatoes and place them in a stew-pan (avoid copper vessels).

Stew and serve

  1. Add the minced onions, powdered sugar, butter dredged with flour, salt, and pepper.

  2. Stir in some bread crumbs and stew for at least three hours.

  3. Serve hot.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Provide the main body, juice and acidity of the stewed dish.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky texture to the stewed sauce.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid as it stews, giving the sauce body.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid during long stewing, helping the dish thicken.
Powdered white sugar
Balances the tomatoes' acidity and adds sweetness.

The step that matters

Stewing for at least three hours. Long, gentle simmering breaks down the tomatoes and lets the flour and bread crumbs thicken the liquid. Too brief a stew leaves the sauce thin and the flavours raw.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Sweet potatofits better
  3. Eggplantfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against tomato, sugar, butter, flour, pepper, bread. 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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