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Beefs Heart Stewed

A stew made from beef heart, onions, celery, parsley, pepper, salt, butter, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,810 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Beefs Heart Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the heart

  1. Wash the beef heart thoroughly and cut it into ½‑inch squares.

  2. Place the heart pieces in a saucepan and cover with water.

  3. Skim off any scum that rises to the surface.

  4. Remove the meat, strain the liquid, and return the meat to the saucepan.

Stew

  1. Add the sliced onion, parsley, chopped celery, pepper, salt, and butter.

  2. Stew until the meat is very tender.

Thicken and serve

  1. Mix the brown flour with a small amount of water to create a paste.

  2. Stir the paste into the stew to thicken it.

  3. Bring to a boil and serve.

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. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  5. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef heart
Is the main protein, which becomes tender through long, slow stewing.
Brown flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth, lightly body-rich gravy when mixed into a paste.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and gives the stew a rounder mouthfeel.
Onion
Contributes savoury sweetness and aroma as it softens into the broth.
Celery
Adds aromatic, vegetal flavour that builds the base of the stew.

The step that matters

Stew until the meat is very tender. Heart is a dense, muscular meat with connective tissue that only breaks down into tenderness with long, gentle simmering. Cooking too briskly or too briefly leaves it tough, so keep the liquid at a low, steady simmer until it yields easily to a fork.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, parsley, celery, pepper, butter, flour):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, parsley, celery, pepper, butter, 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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