Skip to main content
Main

Mock Beef Steak Pudding

A steamed pudding made with meat, onions, potatoes, pastry crust, and baking powder.

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 ↓

Mock Beef Steak Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Cut the Meatose into small pieces.

  2. Chop the onions finely and slice the potatoes.

  3. Add the seasoning and water. Mix well.

Make the pastry

  1. Rub the butter into the flour.

  2. Add the baking powder, salt, and cold water.

  3. Roll out the dough.

Assemble and steam

  1. Grease a basin with butter.

  2. Line the basin with pastry.

  3. Fill the basin with the meat mixture.

  4. Cover with pastry.

  5. Steam for 2½ hours.

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. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Meatose
Forms the main body of the filling and provides the savoury meat element.
Flour
Forms the gluten network in the dough that holds the pastry together.
Butter or margarine
Adds fat that tenderises the pastry and keeps it short and flaky.
Baking powder
Releases gas to lighten the pastry as it heats.
Potatoes
Add starch that thickens the filling's juices and gives body to the pudding.

The step that matters

Covering and sealing the pastry. The pudding is steamed, so the cover must seal firmly to the lining; a gap lets steam and juices escape and leaves the filling dry or the pastry soggy.

Swap the onion

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

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

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

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesPotato RollsPotato Rolls78 recipesPotato ChipsPotato Chips53 recipesSweet Potato CroquettesSweet Potato Croquettes53 recipes