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To Roast Beef Heart

A roasted beef heart stuffed with bread crumbs, suet, ham, butter, herbs, mustard, and onion, served with gravy and currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Marjoram and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

To Roast Beef Heart

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and clean the beef heart, removing all blood from the pipes.

  2. Parboil the heart in boiling water for 10 to 15 minutes, then drain.

Stuff and roast

  1. Lard the heart and fill it with stuffing made from bread crumbs, suet, ham, butter, marjoram, thyme, parsley, salt, pepper, mustard, and onion.

  2. Roast the heart immediately, basting well with a mixture of suet and butter.

  3. Roast for 20 minutes per pound.

Serve

  1. Serve with drawn gravy and currant jelly.

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. Marjoram + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Marjoram + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

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

  5. Marjoram + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef heart
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender with slow roasting.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and fat in the stuffing, keeping it moist and giving it body.
Suet
Adds fat that bastes the heart and keeps the lean meat moist as it roasts.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the stuffing and basting mixture, aiding browning.
Ham
Contributes savoury, salty flavour to the stuffing.
Onion
Adds aroma and savoury depth to the stuffing as it cooks.

The step that matters

Parboil before stuffing and roasting. Parboiling firms the muscle and draws out residual blood, so the roast cooks cleanly and the stuffing is not diluted by blood. Skipping or shortening it leaves a bloodier, looser result.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, bread, ham, butter, marjoram, thyme, pepper):

  1. Winter savoryfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Rosemaryfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, bread, ham, butter, marjoram, thyme, pepper. 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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