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Beef, Stewed, Leg of

A leg of beef stewed with suet, herbs, and cloves after being salted.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Marjoram and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,075 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Beef, Stewed, Leg of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Make a forcemeat by mixing suet, savory, marjoram, cloves, pepper, and salt.

  2. Make several holes in the salted leg of beef and fill them with the forcemeat.

  3. Place the beef in a deep baking pan.

  4. Cover the beef with some forcemeat.

Stew and serve

  1. Fill the pan more than half full with water.

  2. Cover the pan tightly and stew the meat for four hours.

  3. Use the forcemeat from the top to garnish.

  4. Cut the garnish into desired shapes.

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 + clovetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  5. Marjoram + beeftop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together912 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Finely shredded suet
Adds fat that melts into the forcemeat, keeping the meat moist and rich.
Leg of beef
Provides the main cut of meat that becomes tender during long, gentle stewing.
Dried savory
Contributes a savory, herbal aroma to the forcemeat.
Dried marjoram
Adds a warm, aromatic herb flavor to the forcemeat.

The step that matters

Cover the pan tightly and stew the meat for four hours. A tight lid traps steam so the beef cooks gently in moist heat. Keeping the water level and lid sealed prevents the meat from drying out during the long stew, which is what lets the connective tissue soften.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against marjoram, pepper, 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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