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Mock Duck

A steak rolled with breadcrumbs, browned, and simmered in tomato and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Mock Duck

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stuffing

  1. Fry the chopped onion in the butter or drippings until soft.

  2. Add the bread crumbs, mixed seasonings, salt, and pepper; mix well.

  3. Spread the mixture over the steak, roll it up, and tie it securely.

Brown and braise

  1. Brown the roll in the fat in a pan.

  2. Transfer the roll to a casserole or covered dish.

  3. In the same pan, add an equal quantity of flour to the fat and brown it.

  4. Add the stock or boiling water and strained tomato; season with salt and pepper.

  5. Pour the sauce over the roll, cover the dish, and cook slowly until the meat is tender, about 2 hours.

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. Pepper + tomatotop 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. Bread + tomatotop 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

Flank or round steak
Forms the outer wrap, and becomes tender through slow, covered cooking.
Butter or drippings
Carries the onion and adds rich fat flavour to the stuffing.
Stale bread crumbs
Soak up moisture and butter to give the stuffing a soft, cohesive texture.
Flour (in the method)
Browned in the pan fat to thicken the sauce.
Strained tomato
Adds acidity and body to the sauce.

The step that matters

Cook slowly until the meat is tender. Flank and round steak are lean, tough cuts. Long, gentle cooking in covered liquid breaks down connective tissue into gelatin, so the meat becomes tender rather than dry and stringy. Rushing with high heat toughens it.

Swap the onion

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

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

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