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Hashed Beef, Potatoes, and Bread Pudding

A savory bread pudding made with cooked beef, potatoes, onions, and a custard of milk, eggs, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Hashed Beef, Potatoes, and Bread Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. In a skillet, melt butter and sauté onion until soft.

  2. Add chopped beef and diced potatoes; season with salt and pepper.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a bowl, combine bread, milk, eggs, vanilla, and sugar; mix well.

  2. Pour the bread mixture into a greased baking dish.

  3. Top with the beef and potato mixture.

  4. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30-40 minutes until set.

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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set the custard, binding the soaked bread into a sliceable pudding.
Bread
Soaks up the milk and egg mixture, giving the pudding its body.
Milk
Provides the liquid that the bread absorbs and the eggs set within.
Potatoes
Add starchy bulk and a soft, tender texture to the filling.
Beef
Supplies the savory, meaty flavour and substance of the filling.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, potato, butter, pepper, bread, milk, egg):

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, potato, butter, pepper, bread, milk, egg. 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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