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Beefsteak Pudding

A suet crust encasing steak, kidneys, onions, and seasonings, baked to form a savory pudding.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beefsteak Pudding

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the dough

  1. Mix suet, flour, and enough water to form a dough.

  2. Roll the dough to medium thickness and cut it into two rounds.

Fill and bake

  1. Place the steak pieces and kidneys on one round, season with salt, pepper, onion, flour, vinegar, and water.

  2. Cover with the second round of dough, pinching the edges to seal.

  3. Place the sealed pudding in a greased bag and bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 45 minutes.

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 + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Onion + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,226 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Flour + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Suet
Melts during baking to keep the dough rich, tender and moist.
Self-raising flour
Forms the dough structure and gives the pudding its light, risen crumb.
Steak
Provides the meat filling that cooks slowly and becomes tender in the steam.
Sheep kidneys
Adds a richer, more savoury flavour and depth to the meat filling.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savoury flavour to the filling.
Flour
Thickens the juices in the filling so they become a light gravy.

The step that matters

Sealing the pudding. Pinching the edges of the top dough firmly to the base keeps steam and juices inside while it cooks. A poor seal lets the filling leak and the pudding dry out or turn soggy.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, 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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