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Breakfast Dish of Beef

A steamed beef dish flavored with walnut ketchup, red currant jelly, and gravy or water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Breakfast Dish of Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut thin slices of beef and place them in a saucepan or basin.

  2. Mix the melted butter, gravy, jelly, and ketchup together, then pour over the beef.

Steam and serve

  1. Cover the saucepan tightly and place it in a larger pot half full of boiling water.

  2. Steam for 30 minutes.

  3. Transfer the meat to a dish and pour the sauce over it.

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

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

  2. Pepper + red curranttop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together267 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  3. Pepper + walnuttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,039 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Butter + walnuttop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Walnut + red curranttop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together31 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold roast beef
Provides the meat that becomes tender and moist during gentle steaming.
Melted butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, moist texture in the sauce.
Gravy or water
Supplies liquid that keeps the beef moist and forms the base of the sauce.
Red currant jelly
Adds sweetness and a fruity tang that balances the savoury sauce.
Walnut ketchup or vinegar
Adds acidity and a deep savoury flavour to the sauce.

The step that matters

Cover the saucepan tightly. A tight lid traps the steam around the beef so it cooks gently in moist heat. If steam escapes, the water in the outer pot can run low and the meat may dry out or cook unevenly.

Swap the red currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, pepper, walnut):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Red currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, pepper, walnut. 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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