Name: Roast Beef with Yorkshire Pudding
Ingredients: 1 piece of beef (size as desired); Coarse sea salt; Black pepper; Flour; 3 to 4 tablespoons butter (size of a hickory nut); ½ pint milk (2 cups); 3 eggs; 3 cups all-purpose flour; 1 teaspoon salt

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Roast Beef with Yorkshire Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

Do not wash the meat.
Wipe the meat with a damp cloth if necessary.
Sprinkle the meat with coarse sea salt, black pepper, and flour.
If the meat is not fatty, place 3 to 4 tablespoons of butter on it.
Place the meat in a dripping pan on a wire rack or small sticks to keep it off the pan.

Roast and baste

Baste the meat often.
Turn the meat often.
Bake the meat for 15 to 20 minutes per pound.
For the Yorkshire pudding, mix 2 cups of milk, 3 eggs, 3 cups of flour, and 1 teaspoon of salt to form a smooth batter.
Pour the batter into the dripping pan 30 minutes before the meat is done.

Serve

Cut the pudding into square pieces.
Place the pudding pieces around the beef once cooked.

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.

Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Beef + milktop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,759 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Beef: Provides the main protein and meaty flavor that the roast is built around.
Eggs: Set with the heat and give the pudding its structure and lift.
Flour: Forms the batter's structure as its starch sets during baking.
Milk: Adds moisture and richness to the batter, helping it puff and brown.
Butter: Adds fat that enriches the meat's flavor and helps it brown.

The step that matters

Pour the batter 30 minutes before the meat is done. The batter needs a hot fat and a hot pan to puff and crisp. Pouring it in too early lets it sit and deflate, and pouring it too late leaves the pudding underbaked in the center.

“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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Roast Beef with Yorkshire Pudding