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Alamode Beef

A slow‑cooked beef stew with wine, onion, herbs, and a stuffed breadcrumb filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove 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 ↓

Alamode Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Tie the beef into a round shape with strong string.

  2. Rub the pepper, salt, ground cloves, and sugar all over the meat the night before cooking.

  3. Mix the bread crumbs, sausages, chopped onion, sweet herbs, ground cloves, salt, pepper, and eggs to make the stuffing.

  4. Make holes in the meat about 2 inches apart and fill them with the stuffing, then sew them up.

Make the stew

  1. Place the clove-studded onion in a pot with water and red wine.

  2. Insert skewers into the pot about 2 inches from the bottom and lay the beef on top.

  3. Cover the pot tightly to keep the steam in and let it stew gently for 4 hours, turning the meat 2–3 times.

  4. Pour a pint of red wine over the meat and let it stew for an additional hour.

Finish and serve

  1. Thicken the gravy with a little flour and salt, skim off the fat, and bring it to a boil.

  2. Serve some gravy over the meat and the rest in a sauce tureen.

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. Pepper + clovetop 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. Clove + red winetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together849 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

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

  5. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Round of beef
Forms the main body of the dish, and long, slow stewing softens its tough connective tissue.
Eggs
Bind the stuffing so it holds together inside the meat.
Bread
Soaks up moisture and gives the stuffing body and a soft texture.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavor, and provides liquid for the slow braise.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as its starch swells when heated in the liquid.

The step that matters

Stew gently with the pot tightly covered. A gentle simmer lets collagen in the beef break down slowly into gelatin, giving tender meat. A hard boil toughens the muscle fibers and can dry the meat, so keep the heat low and the lid sealed.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, clove, sugar, bread, egg, red wine):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, clove, sugar, bread, egg, red wine. 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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