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To Collar Beef

A method of preserving beef by salting, seasoning, and slow boiling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

To Collar Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Cure

  1. Lay the beef in a dish with salt and saltpetre, rubbing it every day for a week.

  2. Remove bones and gristle, and skin the inside part.

Season and roll

  1. Cover the meat with finely chopped herbs and spices.

  2. Roll the meat tightly and bind it.

Cook and shape

  1. Wrap the meat in a cloth and boil gently for 7 to 8 hours.

  2. Place under a weight while hot to shape it oval.

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 + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Sage + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Sage + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Flank of beef
Provides the lean meat that is cooked slowly and sliced after rolling.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during the week-long cure.
Saltpetre
Helps preserve the meat and gives it a characteristic pink colour during curing.
Parsley
Adds fresh, green herbal aroma to the outside of the rolled meat.

The step that matters

Place under a weight while hot to shape it oval.. Pressing the meat while it is still hot lets the softened connective tissue bind and hold a firm shape as it cools. Pressing after it cools tends to leave it crumbly and uneven.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, parsley, sage, thyme, marjoram, pepper):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Oreganofits better
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, parsley, sage, thyme, marjoram, pepper. 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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