Why it works: Meat and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,777 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓
How to Gut and Cure Meats
Ingredients
Directions
Mix part of the salt and sugar together.
Cover the bottom of a barrel with salt.
Place the meat in the barrel.
Dissolve the soda and saltpeter in hot water and add to the brine.
Pour the brine over the meat and place a board with a weight on top to keep it submerged.
Let the meat intended for dried beef remain in the brine for three weeks.
Remove the meat, let it stand overnight, then string and dry it.
If smoking, hang it up to smoke for a few days, turning it once a day for even exposure.
Let it remain for three to four weeks.
Test by cutting a piece; it should be well dried on the outside and free from rawness in the center.
When dried, sprinkle with ground black pepper, pack in paper sacks, tie tightly, and hang in a cool, dry, dark place.
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.
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Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together8,777 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together19,401 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Meat + sugartop 34% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,866 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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