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Beef Steaks with Cucumbers

Beef steaks served with a sautéed cucumber and onion mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cucumber and onion match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,050 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Steaks with Cucumbers

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Slice and pare the cucumbers and onions.

Cook the vegetables

  1. Fry the cucumbers and onions in butter until golden.

  2. Add gravy or boiling water and keep hot while cooking the steak.

Cook and serve

  1. Broil or fry the steak to your liking.

  2. Serve the steak topped with the cucumber and onion mixture.

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. Cucumber + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,050 recipes

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

  2. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  3. Cucumber + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,991 recipes

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

  4. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Cucumbers
Soften when fried and give the topping a mild, fresh-cooked body.
Onions
Caramelise when fried in butter, adding sweetness and savoury depth to the topping.
Butter
Carries the frying heat and promotes golden browning of the vegetables.
Gravy or boiling water
Adds moisture and liquid so the vegetables cook gently and stay hot.

The step that matters

Frying the cucumbers and onions until golden. Frying over steady heat in butter browns the sugars in the onions and drives off surface moisture from the cucumbers. Cooking too hot can scorch the butter and onions before the cucumbers soften.

Swap the cucumber

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Cucumberthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, butter, 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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