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Beef A-LA-mode

A slow‑cooked beef with a breadcrumb and onion stuffing, simmered in water and served with a flour‑thickened gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Beef A-LA-mode

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. With a sharp knife, cut incisions in the meat about 1 inch apart and within 1 inch of the opposite side.

  2. Season the meat with coarse sea salt and black pepper to taste.

  3. In a bowl, mix the bread crumbs, chopped onion, butter, and additional salt and pepper to taste. Fill the incisions in the meat with the dressing.

Braise and finish

  1. Place the meat in a pot with 1 pint of water and cover it tightly. Simmer for 6 to 8 hours. Optionally, add whole cloves and allspice for extra flavor.

  2. Once cooked, remove the meat and thicken the gravy with a little flour. Let the gravy boil once before serving.

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 + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

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

  5. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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 becomes tender during long, slow simmering.
Bread crumbs
Absorb butter and juices in the stuffing, keeping the filling moist and giving it body.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the stuffing, carrying flavor and keeping it moist.
Onion
Adds savory aroma and sweetness to the stuffing as it softens during cooking.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a gravy.

The step that matters

Simmer for 6 to 8 hours. Long, gentle simmering breaks down the tough connective tissue in a round of beef, making it tender. Boiling hard instead can toughen the meat and dry out the surface, so keep the liquid at a low, steady simmer under a tight lid.

Swap the clove

The recipe marks clove as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, bread, onion, butter, allspice, flour):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, bread, onion, butter, allspice, 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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