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Beef Loaf

A loaf of ground beef mixed with cream, eggs, butter, salt, sage, and pepper, baked and sliced.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Beef Loaf

Why it works: Sage and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Beef Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Grind the beef using a meat grinder.

  2. Mix in the cream, egg yolks, egg white, melted butter, salt, sage, and pepper.

  3. Pack the mixture solidly into a bread pan.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 30 to 40 minutes.

  2. Let it cool, then slice thinly and garnish with sliced pickles or olives.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  4. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Butter + sagetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,312 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

Beef
Provides the main structure and protein body of the loaf, which sets as it cooks.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the loaf tender rather than dry.
Egg yolks
Add fat and richness and help bind the loaf as the proteins set.
Egg white
Helps bind the mixture and gives the loaf a firmer set when baked.
Melted butter
Adds fat for flavour and a softer, moister texture in the cooked meat.

The step that matters

Pack the mixture solidly into a bread pan. Packing removes air pockets so the loaf holds together when sliced. Loose packing can leave gaps and let the loaf crumble or dry out unevenly while baking.

Swap the sage

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, cream, egg, butter, pepper. 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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