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Boiled Corned Beef

A boiled corned beef served with butter sauce and mashed turnips.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Boiled Corned Beef

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Boiled Corned Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Wash the round beef in three or four waters and remove all salt from the outside. Skewer it into shape and tie it with stout tape or twine.

  2. Place the beef in a pot, cover with cold water, and boil for about twenty minutes per pound, turning the meat three times while cooking.

  3. Drain the beef very dry, and serve with drawn butter in a sauce-boat. Serve with mashed turnips boiled separately.

Make the gravy and finish

  1. Melt two ounces of butter over a slow fire, then stir in a tablespoonful of flour. When the mixture simmers, add chopped onion and a dessert spoonful of chopped parsley, and brown.

  2. Season with pepper, add a little stock or gravy, or water, then mince the meat and return it to the pot. Heat gradually until nearly boiling, then thicken with a teaspoonful of flour. Add a little ketchup or sauce of any kind.

Bake the loaf

  1. Mix the beef with three dozen small soda biscuits rolled fine, four eggs, one cup of milk, ground mace, two tablespoons of black pepper, and one tablespoon of melted butter. Pack the mixture into a tin pan that will just fill, baste with butter and water, and bake for two hours in a slow oven.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

1256Calories
57 gProtein
48 gFat
144 gCarbs

Counts 9 of 11 ingredients. The other 2 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 9 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Beef100g cooked250
Biscuit1 medium (45g)166
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Waternot in our table0
Macenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

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. See the original page.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Flour + biscuittop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together889 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  5. Biscuit + parsleytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together204 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the minced beef and set the loaf as they cook.
Soda biscuits
Absorb moisture and give the loaf body and a crumbly texture.
Milk
Adds moisture so the loaf stays tender rather than dry.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as it cooks in the butter.
Butter
Adds richness and fat for flavour and moisture.

The step that matters

Drain the beef very dry. Surface water dilutes the drawn butter and loosens the sauce, so draining well keeps the serving flavour concentrated and the sauce clinging to the meat.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, milk, pepper, butter, flour, biscuit, egg):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, milk, pepper, butter, flour, biscuit, egg. 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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