Skip to main content
Main

Filet De Bceuf a LA Macedoine

Beef filet cooked with mixed vegetables such as beans, cauliflower, asparagus, carrots, and turnips in stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Cauliflower and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 286 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Filet De Bceuf a LA Macedoine

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Lard the filet as directed in the recipe for Fricandeau of Veal.

  2. Place the filet in a saucepan on a bed of vegetable scraps and larding pork.

  3. Cover with stock and simmer for 1 hour or until tender.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Cut the carrots and turnips into olive shapes, and the beans into diamonds.

  2. Cut half a cauliflower into small branches and prepare the asparagus.

  3. Cook the vegetables separately as directed for Green Vegetables.

Serve

  1. Once the filet is done, heat the vegetables in a little of the broth.

  2. Arrange the vegetables around the filet, strain broth over it, and serve hot.

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. Cauliflower + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together286 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Cauliflower + asparagustop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together163 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  4. Beans + asparagustop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together292 recipes

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

  5. Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

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

What each ingredient does

Filet of beef
Is the main cut, cooked gently in stock until tender.
Larding pork
Adds fat that bastes the lean filet and keeps it moist during simmering.
Stock
Gently cooks the filet and forms the broth that flavours and moistens the dish.
String beans
Add crisp texture and fresh colour to the plate of vegetables.
Cauliflower
Adds mild flavour and a tender-crisp texture as a vegetable garnish.
Asparagus
Adds a tender-crisp texture and a fresh, green flavour.

The step that matters

Simmering the filet. Simmering gently rather than boiling keeps the meat tender and juicy. Vigorous boiling toughens the proteins and pushes out moisture, so the filet becomes dry and chewy.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pork, beans, cauliflower, asparagus, turnip):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Lettucefits better
  3. Broccolifits better
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pork, beans, cauliflower, asparagus, turnip. 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.

You might also like

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesAsparagus SoupAsparagus Soup179 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipes