Skip to main content
Main

Beef Pie with Potato Crust

A savory pie of roast beef and gravy topped with a mashed potato crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Pie with Potato Crust

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.

Make the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a baking pan, combine the beef, gravy, butter, onion, pepper, salt, and enough water to make plenty of gravy.

  3. Heat over medium heat and thicken with flour, stirring gently.

Top and bake

  1. Boil the potatoes until tender, then mash them smooth.

  2. Beat the mashed potatoes with milk and butter until light.

  3. Spread the potato mixture in a thick layer over the meat in the baking dish.

  4. Brush the top with melted butter.

  5. Bake in the oven until the top is golden brown.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  5. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 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

Cold roast beef
Provides the meat filling that the gravy and potato topping surround.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as it heats, giving the filling body.
Potatoes
Form the mashed topping, which browns in the oven and holds the filling in.
Milk
Makes the mashed potato topping softer and lighter.
Butter
Adds richness to the gravy, mashed potatoes, and brushed top for browning.

The step that matters

Thickening the gravy with flour. Stirring gently while the flour heats lets it dissolve evenly into the liquid. Without even mixing, lumps form and the gravy stays thin or uneven.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, pepper, flour, potato, milk):

  1. Chivefits about as well
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, pepper, flour, potato, milk. 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.

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesRoast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipes