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Beefsteak and Tomatoes

A stew of beefsteak and tomatoes served over buttered toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tomato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,923 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beefsteak and Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stew

  1. Stew the tomatoes for one hour with salt and pepper.

  2. Cut the beefsteak into small pieces and add to the pot.

  3. Boil for an additional 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Lay buttered toast in a deep dish.

  2. Pour the steak and tomato mixture over the toast.

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. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Tomato + buttertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,918 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Tomatoes
Break down during stewing to form the sauce that moistens the toast.
Beefsteak
Provides the meat, which becomes tender as it simmers in the stew.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor to the toast and helps keep it from soaking through too quickly.

The step that matters

Boil for an additional 15 minutes. Simmering after the steak is added lets the connective tissue soften gradually. Boiling too hard can toughen the meat, so keep the pot at a gentle simmer.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter. 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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