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Beef a LA Vinaigrette

Cold beef stewed with water, wine, herbs, onion, bay leaf, cloves, and pepper, served with a vinegar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Beef a LA Vinaigrette

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the beef

  1. Stew the beef with water, white wine, sweet herbs, onion, bay leaf, pounded cloves, and pepper until the liquid is nearly gone, turning once.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Strain the gravy and mix it with a little vinegar for sauce.

  2. Serve cold.

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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 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. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. White wine + vinegartop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,776 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender as it stews slowly in liquid.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the stewing liquid, flavouring the gravy that becomes the sauce.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity to the strained gravy, giving the sauce its tangy vinaigrette character.
Onion
Adds savoury sweetness and aroma to the stewing liquid, flavouring the gravy.

The step that matters

Stewing until the liquid is nearly gone. Cooking slowly in a small amount of liquid lets the beef become tender while its flavours concentrate into the gravy. Stopping at the right point, with the liquid nearly reduced but not dry, keeps the meat moist and gives the sauce enough body to strain and use.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, white wine, onion, pepper, vinegar):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, white wine, onion, pepper, vinegar. 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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