Name: English Beefsteak Pie
Ingredients: Raw steak, cut into pieces; Boiled potatoes, sliced; Hard-boiled eggs, chopped; Salt, to taste; Pepper, to taste; Ginger, a pinch; Pie crust

Why it works: Pepper and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,800 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

English Beefsteak Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Make a good pie crust.

Assemble the pie

Line the sides of a deep pudding dish with the crust, leaving the bottom uncovered.
Layer the steak, potatoes, and eggs alternately in the dish.
Season each layer with salt, pepper, and ginger.
Make two layers of each ingredient.
Sprinkle a little water over the top and cover with pie crust.

Bake

Bake for one hour.

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.

Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together6,800 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,305 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Potato + gingertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together992 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Potato + eggtop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,978 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Egg + gingertop 33% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together7,337 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Raw steak: Provides the main meat filling, which becomes tender and flavourful as it cooks in the oven.
Boiled potatoes: Adds bulk and a soft, starchy body that soaks up the savoury juices.
Hard-boiled eggs: Adds richness and a firm, sliced texture between the meat and potato layers.