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Beef Scallop

A baked beef dish layered with sauce, parsley, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Ketchup and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,099 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Beef Scallop

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Make the sauce

  1. In a stewpan, fry the chopped onion in beef dripping until brown.

  2. Stir in the flour until smoothly mixed, then add vegetable stock and bring to a boil.

  3. Season with salt, pepper, and tomato ketchup, then simmer for 10 minutes and strain into a basin.

Layer and bake

  1. Butter a pie dish and layer cold beef slices, pouring some sauce over each layer.

  2. Sprinkle with chopped parsley and strained onion, then continue layering with meat and sauce.

  3. Cover the top with breadcrumbs, drizzle with warm dripping, and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for at least 1 hour.

  4. If breadcrumbs brown too quickly, cover with greased paper.

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. Ketchup + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Beef + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 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

Beef
Provides the main meat and savoury flavour of the dish.
All-purpose flour
Thickens the stock into a smooth sauce that coats the beef.
Beef dripping
Adds rich fat and flavour for frying the onion and for browning the topping.
Fine dry breadcrumbs
Forms a crisp, browned crust over the top during baking.
Tomato ketchup
Adds sweetness and acidity that give the sauce a tangy flavour.

The step that matters

Watching the breadcrumb topping. Breadcrumbs brown quickly in a hot oven, so covering them with greased paper stops them burning before the dish is heated through during the long bake.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, flour, pepper, tomato, ketchup, parsley, sauce):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, flour, pepper, tomato, ketchup, parsley, sauce. 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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