Why it works: Onion and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Beefsteak and Onions
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Prepare the steak as usual.
Cook and serve
In a frying pan, heat the beef drippings or butter and fry the sliced onions until brown.
Place the cooked steak on a plate and layer the fried onions on top.
Cover and let it rest for five minutes before serving hot.
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.
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Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,092 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
- Steak
- Is the main protein, cooked and served as the base of the dish.
- Onions
- Browning in fat develops sweetness and savoury flavour, and they top the steak.
- Beef drippings or butter
- Fat carries the heat to the onions and helps them brown evenly.
The step that matters
Frying the onions until brown. Onions need enough fat and steady heat to brown rather than steam. Browning, the Maillard reaction, builds sweet, savoury flavour, so pale or soggy onions will taste flat.
“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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