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Fried Beefsteaks

Fried beefsteaks cooked in their own fat with pepper, salt, and a gravy of boiling water or ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 ↓

Fried Beefsteaks

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the steak

  1. Trim some fat from the steak.

  2. If the steaks are tough, pound them with a rolling pin.

Fry

  1. Place the steak in a frying pan over medium heat.

  2. Add the steak to the pan.

  3. Cover the pan.

  4. Fry briskly until one side is done.

  5. Sprinkle the steak with pepper and salt.

  6. Turn the steak.

  7. Cook to your desired doneness.

  8. Transfer the steak to a hot dish.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Add ⅓ cup of boiling water or ketchup to the pan to make gravy.

  2. Bring the gravy to a boil.

  3. Pour the gravy over the steak.

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. Beef + ketchuptop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Pepper + ketchuptop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,207 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef steak
Provides the main protein, which browns and firms as it fries.
Fat from the steak
Renders into the pan to fry the steak and add richness.

The step that matters

Fry briskly until one side is done. High, fast heat browns the surface and seals in juices. Too low a heat slowly steams the meat and leaves it grey and dry.

“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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