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Rolled Beef

Rolled Beef is a boiled, herb-seasoned beef roll.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Rolled Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Trim all fat and skin from the flank of beef and lay it flat on a table.

  2. Mix together the herbs: parsley, sage, thyme, savory, marjoram, and tarragon. Add salt, pepper, and mixed spices to the herbs.

  3. Spread the herb mixture evenly over the surface of the meat.

  4. Roll the meat tightly and tie it up in a cloth with string.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil the rolled beef for 5 hours.

  2. After boiling, press the meat under a heavy weight until cold.

  3. Remove the cloth, and the rolled beef is ready to 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 their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

  5. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flank of beef
Forms the main body of the dish; long slow boiling turns its connective tissue tender.
Parsley
Adds fresh, green herbal aroma that brightens the rich meat.
Sage
Contributes a savoury, slightly bitter herbal aroma to the meat.
Salt
Seasons the meat throughout and helps draw out and hold moisture in the flavour.
Thyme
Adds a warm, earthy herbal aroma that complements the beef.

The step that matters

Boiling for 5 hours. Long, gentle simmering is needed to break down the beef's connective tissue so it becomes tender. Too short a time leaves the meat tough, while a hard rolling boil can toughen muscle fibres and dry the outside.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

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