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Pork Steaks

Pork steaks cooked over a clear fire and finished in butter, salt, pepper, sage, and grated onion.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Pork Steaks

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.

Cook the steaks

  1. Remove the skin from the pork steaks.

  2. Broil the steaks over a clear fire until well cooked but not dried out.

Season and finish

  1. In a bowl, mix the butter, salt, pepper, sage, and grated onion.

  2. Place the hot platter ready and turn the steaks in the butter mixture several times.

  3. Cover the platter closely and leave in a 350°F (175°C) oven for a few moments before serving.

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 + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  2. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  5. Sage + oniontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Pork steaks
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender and juicy when cooked through without overdrying.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, carrying the seasonings and helping keep the meat moist.
Grated onion
Adds savory aroma and a little moisture to the butter coating.
Dried sage
Contributes a warm, herbal aroma that flavors the fat coating the steaks.

The step that matters

Broil until well cooked but not dried out. Pork is lean, and its muscle fibers tighten and squeeze out moisture once overcooked. Stopping at the point of full doneness without going further keeps the steaks juicy and tender.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, butter, pepper, sage. 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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