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Rolled Beefsteak

Rolled beefsteak with a savory gravy made from onions, bread crumbs, herbs, mushrooms, catsup, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Rolled Beefsteak

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the steak

  1. Flatten the sirloin steak with the broad side of a hatchet.

  2. Fry the sliced onion in butter until golden.

  3. Remove the fried onion with a skimmer.

  4. Add the steak to the pan.

  5. Fry the steak quickly on both sides until browned.

  6. Chop the fried onion.

  7. Mix the chopped onion with bread crumbs, minced herbs, and chopped mushrooms.

  8. Spread the mixture over the steak.

  9. Roll the steak up tightly.

  10. Secure the roll with kitchen twine and skewers.

Simmer and make the gravy

  1. Place the roll in a saucepan with cold water and cover tightly.

  2. Simmer on low heat for two hours, turning occasionally.

  3. Transfer the meat to a hot dish.

  4. Strain the gravy.

  5. Add hot water to the gravy if needed.

  6. Thicken the gravy with browned flour.

  7. Stir in minced mushrooms, catsup, and butter.

  8. Boil the mixture for three minutes.

  9. Remove the twine and skewers from the steak.

  10. Pour the gravy over the steak.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Bread + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sirloin steak
Forms the main meat that is rolled around the stuffing and becomes tender during slow simmering.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and give the stuffing body so it holds together inside the roll.
Butter
Adds richness and helps brown the onion and steak during frying.
Browned flour
Thickens the strained liquid into a gravy with a deeper color and flavor.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savory depth to the stuffing once fried and chopped.
Catsup
Adds sweetness and acidity to the finished gravy.

The step that matters

Frying the steak quickly on both sides until browned. Searing builds browned flavor on the surface through the Maillard reaction. Frying too long before rolling can toughen or dry the meat, and the roll must hold its shape during the long simmer.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, bread, mushroom, flour):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, bread, mushroom, flour. 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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