Name: Boeuf Bourguignon
Ingredients: 3-4 pounds beef stewing meat; Six slices bacon (chopped or pork lardons); Olive Oil; 1 carrot sliced; 2 cups onions sliced; 3 cups red wine; 2 cups beef broth; 1 bay leaf; 1 tsp thyme; 1 large tomato (peeled); 8 oz mushrooms quartered; 1 tablespoon tomato paste; 3 cloves garlic

Why it works: Beef and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,690 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

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.

Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,690 recipes

Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).
Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,563 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Olive + thymetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,948 recipes

Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (apple, fatty).
Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together21,601 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together17,092 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

Beef stewing meat: Provides the main substance, becoming tender through long, slow simmering in liquid.
Red wine: Forms the braising liquid that flavors the sauce and helps break down the meat's connective tissue.
Bacon: Adds smoky, savory fat that carries flavor from the start of the dish into the sauce.
Onions: Soften and sweeten as they cook, adding body and savory depth to the sauce.
Mushrooms: Release moisture and add earthy umami flavor as they brown in the pan.
Tomato paste: Adds concentrated savory depth and color to the sauce after being cooked briefly.

The step that matters

Brown the beef. Browning creates deep flavor through the Maillard reaction. Beef crowded into the pan steams instead of browning, so brown it in batches for rich color and taste.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, meat, pork, olive, onion, red wine, thyme):

Tomatofits better
Potatofits better
Shallotfits about as well
Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, meat, pork, olive, onion, red wine, thyme. 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.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Beef	100g cooked	250
Pork	100g cooked	242
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Bacon	1 slice cooked (8g)	43
Carrot	1 medium (61g)	25
Wine	2 tbsp cooking wine (30ml)	25
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Mushroom	1/2 cup sliced (35g)	15
Thyme	1 tsp dried (1.4g)	4
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Bay Leaf	1 leaf (0.6g)	2
Meat	not in our table	0

Boeuf Bourguignon