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Mtnce Meat

A spiced beef stew with fruits, spices, and sweet cider.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Mtnce Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the beef and season with salt and pepper while cooking.

  2. Run the beef and suet through a food chopper, or chop the suet by hand.

  3. Chop the citron, orange, and lemon peel in the food chopper.

  4. Wash the currants and raisins well; chop the raisins if desired.

Mix and cook

  1. Mix all ingredients together, adding chopped apples immediately.

  2. Add lemon and orange juice, along with the grated zest of a lemon and an orange.

  3. Stir in brown sugar and spices.

  4. Use sweet cider to moisten the mixture if available.

  5. Cook on the stove for 1 to 2 hours, stirring to prevent scorching.

Store

  1. Store in a cool place; it can be reheated and adjusted with more apples, sugar, or moisture as needed.

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. Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  2. Orange + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,634 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Cinnamon + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,390 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  4. Cinnamon + orangetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,437 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Cinnamon + appletop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Provides the meaty body and savory base that the fruit and spices surround.
Suet
Adds fat that carries flavor and gives the mixture a rich, moist texture.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness and a deeper, caramel-like flavor as the mixture cooks.
Apples
Contribute moisture, body and tart fruit flavor to the mixture.
Raisins
Add concentrated sweetness and chewy texture to the mixture.
Lemons
Add acidity and bright aroma that balance the sweetness.

The step that matters

Cook on the stove, stirring to prevent scorching. The mixture is rich in sugar and fruit, which can burn on the bottom of the pot. Frequent stirring spreads heat evenly and keeps the mixture from sticking and scorching during the 1 to 2 hours of cooking.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, clove, cinnamon, raisin, apple, orange, lemon):

  1. Cranberryfits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Quincefits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, clove, cinnamon, raisin, apple, orange, lemon. 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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