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Ox-Tail, Stewed

A stew of ox-tail pieces simmered with onion, carrots, herbs, stock, salt, pepper, optionally lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and pepper 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 ↓

Ox-Tail, Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the ox-tail

  1. Disjoint the ox-tail.

  2. Cut it into pieces about 1.5 inches long.

  3. Place the pieces in boiling water for 15 minutes.

  4. Remove the pieces from the water.

  5. Wipe the pieces with a soft cloth.

Stew

  1. Put them in a stewpan with stock or water, onion, carrots, herbs, salt, and pepper.

  2. Simmer gently until the meat parts easily from the bones.

Finish and serve

  1. Transfer the pieces to a hot dish.

  2. Reduce the gravy.

  3. Strain the gravy over the meat.

  4. Garnish with toasted sippets.

  5. Optionally, add a little lemon juice for flavor.

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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  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

Ox-tail
Provides the meat and bones, whose collagen breaks down into a rich, tender texture during slow simmering.
Stock or water
Forms the cooking liquid that gently braises the meat and becomes the base of the gravy.
Carrots
Add sweetness and body to the gravy as they soften during the simmer.
Onion
Contributes savory aroma and sweetness to the cooking liquid and gravy.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until the meat parts easily from the bones. Boiling vigorously toughens muscle fibres and can make the meat ragged, while slow simmering lets collagen soften into gelatin so the meat becomes tender and loosens from the bones.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (clove, carrot, pepper):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against clove, carrot, pepper. 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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