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Beef Steak Pie

A pie filled with sliced beef strips, fat, onions, and optional oysters, baked in pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Steak Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Take a pie dish of the desired size.

  3. Lay out the steak strips with a small piece of fat on each.

  4. Season with salt and pepper, and dust with flour.

  5. Roll up each strip neatly and place it in the dish.

  6. Sprinkle a little seasoning and flour between each layer.

  7. Add shredded onion or shallot and oysters if desired.

Assemble and bake

  1. Create a pastry edge around the dish.

  2. Add enough water to cover the meat rolls.

  3. Cover with a crust about ½ inch thick and decorate the top.

  4. Bake for 2 hours.

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 + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Onion + meattop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Oyster + meattop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together536 recipes

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

  4. Flour + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Rump steak
Provides the meat that becomes tender during the long, slow bake.
Flour
Dusted on the meat, it helps thicken the juices into a rich gravy.
Fat
Small pieces laid on each strip melt during baking, adding moisture and flavour to the meat.
Water
Added around the meat rolls, it forms steam and a savoury liquid during baking.

The step that matters

Adding enough water to cover the meat rolls. Long baking can dry out meat if there is too little liquid. Covering the rolls with water lets them simmer gently in the pie, keeping them moist while the flour thickens the juices.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, flour, oyster, meat):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Okrafits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, flour, oyster, meat. 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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