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Beef Hash, English Style

A baked hash of diced roast beef, onions, and mashed potatoes topped with breadcrumbs and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Ketchup and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,099 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Beef Hash, English Style

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.

Make the beef sauce

  1. In a skillet, fry the chopped onion in butter until slightly browned.

  2. Add the flour and fry together for 2 minutes.

  3. Stir in the gravy or soup stock to create a sauce.

  4. Add the diced beef, ketchup, and Worcestershire sauce; mix well.

  5. Transfer the mixture to a deep baking dish.

Top and bake

  1. Combine the mashed potatoes with the egg yolks and spread over the beef mixture.

  2. Sprinkle with bread crumbs and melted butter.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 10 minutes until the potatoes are browned.

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. Ketchup + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  4. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

What each ingredient does

Roast beef
Provides the meaty base of the hash, cooked gently in the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the gravy into a sauce that clings to the beef and potatoes.
Egg yolks
Enrich the mashed potatoes, helping them brown and hold a creamy, set texture.
Mashed potatoes
Form the topping that bakes into a soft interior with a browned surface.
Butter
Adds richness to the fried onion and browns the buttered bread crumb topping.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden crust on top when mixed with melted butter and baked.

The step that matters

Browning the potato topping. The potatoes need enough time in a hot oven for their surface to brown. Egg yolks and melted butter help the top color and set, while the filling must be fully hot through.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, onion, butter, flour, ketchup, sauce, egg):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Horseradishfits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, onion, butter, flour, ketchup, sauce, egg. 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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