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Stewed Round Steak

Stewed round steak is browned and simmered with tomatoes, seasoned with salt and pepper, served over potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stewed Round Steak

Ingredients

Directions

Brown the steaks

  1. Brown the steaks quickly over medium‑high heat in a hot frying pan.

  2. If the steaks have no fat, add drippings or butter.

Stew and serve

  1. Add the tomatoes and season with salt and pepper.

  2. Cover the pan and gently stew the steaks until cooked to desired doneness.

  3. Serve the steaks on top of the tomatoes with plain boiled or baked potatoes.

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. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  4. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Round beef
Provides the main protein, which becomes tender through gentle, covered stewing.
Drippings or butter
Adds fat for browning the steaks and carries flavor into the pan.
Tomatoes
Supply moisture and acidity that form the sauce the steaks stew in.

The step that matters

Gently stew the steaks until cooked to desired doneness. Covered, gentle heat keeps the moisture in the pan and lets tough connective tissue in round steak soften slowly. Rapid boiling toughens the meat and dries the sauce.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Onionfits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, pepper. 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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