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Alamode Beef

A slow‑cooked beef dish stewed with onion, wine, and herbs, served with a thickened gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Alamode Beef

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Mix the salt, pepper, sweet herbs, and eggs in a bowl.

  3. Make holes in the beef and fill them with the onion studded with cloves.

  4. Place skewers in a pot about two inches from the bottom and lay the beef on them.

Stew

  1. Add the water and red wine, then cover the pot tightly.

  2. Let it stew gently for four hours, turning the meat two or three times.

  3. Pour a pint of red wine over the meat and let it stew for an additional hour.

Finish and serve

  1. Thicken the gravy with a little flour and salt, skim off the fat, and boil it once.

  2. Serve some gravy over the beef and the rest in a sauce-tureen.

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 + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Clove + red winetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together849 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + oniontop 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

Round beef
Long, gentle stewing breaks down its connective tissue, making the meat tender.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavor, and colors the gravy and meat.
Flour
Its starch thickens the cooking liquid into a gravy.
Onion
Softens during stewing, adding sweetness and aroma to the gravy.
Water
Provides the liquid that keeps the meat moist while it braises.

The step that matters

Keep the stew at a gentle simmer under a tight lid. Round beef is tough, and its connective tissue turns tender only through long, low, moist heat. A hard boil tightens the muscle fibers and dries the meat, while a loose lid lets the liquid evaporate.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, egg, clove, red wine, flour):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, egg, clove, red wine, flour. 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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