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Beef, Breslau

A roast beef forcemeat baked in buttered coffee cups with herbs and gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Beef, Breslau

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the forcemeat

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a bowl, combine bread crumbs, beaten eggs, and brown gravy.

  3. Add butter, salt, lemon peel, thyme, parsley, and cayenne; mix well.

  4. Finely mince the roast beef and mix it into the forcemeat.

Bake and serve

  1. Spoon the mixture into buttered coffee cups.

  2. Bake for 30 minutes.

  3. Turn out and serve with egg balls and additional gravy 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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  4. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Bread + beeftop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the crumbs and gravy together and set the mixture as it bakes.
Bread crumbs
Provide bulk and body so the forcemeat holds its shape.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and helps the top brown in the oven.
Roast beef
Supplies the main meaty flavor and substance of the dish.
Brown gravy
Adds moisture and savory depth to the forcemeat.

The step that matters

Mixing the forcemeat. Mince the roast beef finely and mix it in evenly so the eggs and crumbs can bind it into a uniform mixture. Large lumps of meat will not set into the same texture and can leave the custard-like mixture uneven when baked.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, egg, butter, lemon, parsley, beef):

  1. Tarragonfits about as well
  2. Thymethe original
  3. Marjoramfits about as well
  4. Nutmegfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, egg, butter, lemon, parsley, beef. 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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