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Hash of Cold Mutton or Beef

A stew of finely chopped cold mutton or beef bones, onions, carrots, and spices, thickened with flour and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,395 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Hash of Cold Mutton or Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gravy

  1. Chop the bones very fine.

  2. Put the bones into a stewing pan.

  3. Add salt, pepper, and spices.

  4. Cover with boiling water.

  5. Let the mixture simmer gently for two hours.

  6. Slice the onion.

  7. Fry the onion until pale brown.

  8. Mix the fried onion with the gravy made from the bones.

  9. Boil the mixture for a while.

  10. Strain the mixture.

  11. Return the strained liquid to the saucepan.

Finish and serve

  1. Thicken the gravy with flour rubbed in butter or plain browned flour.

  2. Add a pinch of brown sugar.

  3. Add some tomato sauce.

  4. Let the gravy boil well.

  5. Add the cut-up meat.

  6. Do not allow the mixture to boil.

  7. Serve with toast or fried slices.

  8. Add a little cayenne pepper if desired.

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. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Carrot + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,021 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the meat and holds together.
Butter
Rubbed into the flour, it helps the flour thicken smoothly with richness.
Bones and trimmings
Simmered for two hours, they release flavour and body into the gravy.
Onion
Fried until pale brown, it adds savoury, sweet aroma to the gravy.

The step that matters

Do not allow the mixture to boil. Once the cut-up meat is added, boiling can toughen the meat proteins and make the gravy cloudy or stringy. Keeping it just below a boil keeps the meat tender.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, butter, pepper, flour, allspice):

  1. Parsnipfits better
  2. Turnipfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, butter, pepper, flour, allspice. 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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