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Roast Beef

Roast Beef is a dish of beef ribs seasoned with salt and pepper, roasted, and served with a flour‑water gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Roast Beef

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Roast Beef

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Wash the beef ribs and season with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  2. Dredge the ribs with a little flour.

Roast

  1. Roast the ribs on a spit before a clear fire, basting frequently.

  2. Alternatively, place the ribs in a roasting pan, season with salt and pepper, and dredge with flour.

  3. Add 1 heaping tablespoon of flour and 1 ½ cups of water to the pan, stirring well.

  4. Roast in a moderately hot oven at 350°F (175°C), basting frequently.

  5. When done and nicely browned, place the beef on a heated dish.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Remove some fat from the gravy, adjust seasoning if necessary, and baste the meat with the gravy.

  2. Pour the gravy into a sauce-tureen and 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  2. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Beef + flourtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Beef and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,677 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Beef ribs
Provide the main cut that is roasted and carved for the dish.
Flour
Dredged onto the meat and stirred into the pan liquid to thicken the gravy.
Water
Mixed with the pan drippings to form a thin gravy that keeps the meat moist.

The step that matters

Removing some fat from the gravy. Fat from the drippings can make the gravy greasy and cause it to separate. Skimming some off before basting keeps the sauce smooth and balanced.

“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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