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Collaring Beef

A flank of beef cured with saltpetre, salt, pepper, cloves, mace, thyme, lemon peel, wrapped, baked with bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,973 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Collaring Beef

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the beef

  1. Slit the beef through the middle.

  2. Rub it with saltpetre and white salt; let it sit for six days.

  3. Season with pepper, cloves, mace, thyme, and lemon peel.

  4. Roll it up tightly and bind with tape.

Bake and set

  1. Cover with pump water and bake in a pan with household bread at 350°F (175°C).

  2. After baking, roll in a cloth and tie at both ends.

  3. Once cool, remove the cloth and tape, and store in a cool place.

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. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + thymetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming firm and sliceable once cooked.
Saltpetre
Cures the meat, helping it keep its pink colour and firmer texture.
White salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during the curing rest.
Pepper
Adds sharp, aromatic seasoning that flavours the meat throughout.
Cloves
Contribute warm, aromatic spice notes to the seasoned meat.
Mace
Adds a warm, delicate spice aroma to the seasoned meat.

The step that matters

Rolling and tying tightly before baking. Tight rolling and firm binding keep the meat compact, so it cooks evenly and holds a neat, sliceable shape rather than falling apart.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, clove, thyme, lemon, bread):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, clove, thyme, lemon, bread. 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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