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A slow‑cooked beef dish with bacon, vegetables, vinegar, and port wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and 7,711 recipes mention both. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Slice and fry the onions until pale brown.

  2. Cut the other vegetables into small pieces.

  3. Cut the bacon into long slices, about 1 inch thick.

  4. Dip the bacon slices into vinegar, then into the seasoning mix of spices and minced herbs.

  5. Make deep holes in the beef to insert the bacon slices.

  6. Rub the beef with the remaining seasoning and herbs.

  7. Bind the beef into a nice shape with kitchen twine.

Braise

  1. Combine the beef, vegetables, vinegar, and water in a well-tinned stew pan.

  2. Simmer gently for 5 hours or longer until the meat is very tender, turning it once or twice.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the beef from the pan and take off the twine.

  2. Place the beef on a hot dish.

  3. Skim off any fat from the gravy.

  4. Add the port wine and bring the gravy to a boil.

  5. Pour the gravy over the beef and serve.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together7,711 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Parsley + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together34,118 recipes

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

  4. Beef + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together17,091 recipes

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

  5. Allspice + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,289 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Flank of beef
Long simmering turns the tough cut tender and gives the braise its body.
Bacon
Fat melts into the meat as it cooks, adding moisture and savory flavor.
Vinegar
Its acidity helps tenderize the meat and brightens the braising liquid.
Onions
Browning them first adds sweetness and depth to the gravy.
Carrots
Break down during simmering, adding sweetness and body to the gravy.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and richness to the gravy when added at the end.

The step that matters

Simmer gently for 5 hours or longer. A gentle, low simmer breaks down the tough connective tissue in flank slowly. A hard boil toughens and dries the meat, so the heat must stay low and steady.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, vinegar, pepper, allspice, clove, parsley, carrot):

  1. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  2. Tomatobetter flavor fit
  3. Parsnipbetter flavor fit
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, vinegar, pepper, allspice, clove, parsley, carrot. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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