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Roast Meats

A simple roast meat prepared by dredging in flour, salt, pepper, and water, then baking and basting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 50,459 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Roast Meats

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Trim and skewer the meat into shape.

  2. Lay the meat in a pan.

  3. Dredge the meat with flour, salt, and pepper.

  4. Pour a little water over the meat.

Roast

  1. Place the pan in a 400°F (200°C) oven until seared.

  2. Turn the roast to avoid burning.

  3. Cook the roast for 10 minutes per pound if small, or 15 minutes per pound if large.

  4. Baste the roast often.

  5. Serve with gravy.

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. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Meat + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Meat + flourtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,529 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Meat
Forms the main body of the dish, and its size sets the cooking time.
Flour
Coats the surface so it browns and forms a crust during roasting.
Water
Adds moisture to the pan, helping keep the surface from drying out.

The step that matters

Turn the roast to avoid burning. Surface sugars and proteins brown quickly in dry oven heat, so the meat can scorch on the side facing the heat source. Turning it regularly promotes even browning and keeps the crust from burning.

“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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