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Chipped Beef Stewed

A stew of chipped dried beef simmered in milk, water, flour, and egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,759 recipes. Both carry 1-hexanal, which smells fruit. The science ↓

Chipped Beef Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Tear dried beef into small pieces.

  2. In a saucepan, combine milk and water.

  3. Add flour to thicken and stir well.

  4. Incorporate the beaten egg and cook until thickened.

  5. Serve hot.

  6. If the beef is too salty, boil it briefly and discard the water before adding the milk and water.

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. Beef + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  2. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Beef + flourtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together10,677 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Dried beef
Supplies the main meaty flavor and the chipped texture of the stew.
Milk
Forms the creamy liquid base that thickens into a sauce.
All-purpose flour
Thickens the liquid as its starch swells when heated.
Egg
Adds richness and helps thicken the sauce as its proteins set when cooked.

The step that matters

Incorporate the beaten egg and cook until thickened. Egg proteins set with heat, so adding it to a very hot liquid can scramble it. Stirring steadily while cooking gently keeps the sauce smooth and evenly thickened.

“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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