Skip to main content
Main

Dutch Beef

A smoked beef prepared with sugar, salt, spices, vinegar, and smoked for a month, then boiled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Garlic and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,115 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Dutch Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Cure

  1. Remove the skin from the beef and rub it all over with 1 pound of coarse sugar.

  2. Let it sit for 3 days, turning daily.

  3. Mix 1 pound of coarse sea salt, 1 pound of common salt, 1 ounce of sal prunelle, 1 ounce of minced garlic, 1 ounce of crushed juniper berries, and 1 pint of vinegar.

  4. Rub this mixture into the meat well for 5 days, turning it in the pickle every 3 days for 2 weeks.

Smoke and store

  1. Bind broad tape around the meat as a collar and coat it thoroughly with pea flour.

  2. Smoke the meat for 1 month using oak logs, sawdust, and beech or birch chips.

  3. Store the smoked meat for at least 2 months before cooking.

Cook and serve

  1. When ready to cook, place the meat in boiling water and simmer gently.

  2. Cut when cold.

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. Garlic + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,115 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  2. Beef + garlictop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Garlic + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,149 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Prime beef
Provides the meat that the cure, smoke and simmering turn into the finished dish.
Coarse sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the salt in the cure.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the meat and preserves it during curing.
Common salt
Preserves the meat and seasons it through the cure.
Vinegar
Adds acidity to the cure, contributing to flavour and preservation.

The step that matters

Rub the cure in fully and turn the meat. Salt and sugar only preserve and season the meat where they reach it. Thorough rubbing and regular turning in the pickle keep the cure evenly distributed, so no part of the beef spoils or tastes unseasoned.

Swap the garlic

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, sugar, vinegar, flour):

  1. Jalapenofits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, sugar, vinegar, 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.

You might also like

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipesBeef BrothBeef Broth67 recipes