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Italian Steak

A braised steak cooked with onions, port, stock, celery, gherkins, cloves, cayenne, and root vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Italian Steak

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Brown the steak

  1. Brown the steak in a stewpan with butter over high heat, turning frequently.

  2. Once browned on both sides, transfer the steak to a baking pan with a tight-fitting lid.

Build the braise

  1. In the same pan, fry the sliced onions, minced shallot, and parsley in the remaining butter.

  2. Spread the onion mixture over the steak in the pan.

  3. Add port, stock, celery, gherkins, cloves, cayenne pepper, and salt to taste.

  4. Cover the pan tightly and bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 1.5 hours.

  5. After 1 hour, add the whole turnip and carrot, cover, and continue baking.

  6. If the roots are young, they will be done in 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Remove the roots, cut them into dice, and place them over the steak.

  2. Serve the steak on a hot dish with the strained gravy poured over.

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. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

  2. Shallot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together202 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Steak
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through slow, moist braising.
Butter
Browns the steak and adds richness and flavour to the onions and gravy.
Onions
Soften during braising and add sweetness that deepens the gravy.
Port
Adds sweetness and acidity, building depth of flavour in the braising liquid.
Stock
Supplies the moist cooking liquid that gently braises the meat and forms the gravy.

The step that matters

Browning the steak over high heat. Browning creates deep flavour through the Maillard reaction. Turning the steak often keeps it from burning and gives an even brown crust before braising.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, shallot, parsley, celery, clove, pepper, turnip):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, shallot, parsley, celery, clove, pepper, turnip. 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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