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Beef Olives

Beef Olives are rolled strips of beef stuffed with bacon, breadcrumbs, herbs, and egg, simmered in stock and served with gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Beef Olives

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Flatten the steak and cut it into thin strips about three inches wide.

  2. Mince the bacon and mix it with breadcrumbs, herbs, salt, pepper, and half the beaten egg.

  3. Spread some of the mixture on each strip of beef, roll up the strips, and tie each with fine string.

  4. Dip the rolls into the remaining egg and place them in a stew pan, packing them lightly.

Cook and make the gravy

  1. Add the stock or water, cover the pan, and let the olives simmer for about an hour.

  2. Once cooked, remove from the pan and mix the flour with a little cold water or stock.

  3. Stir the flour mixture with a quarter teaspoon of browning into the gravy and boil for two to three minutes.

  4. Add the Worcestershire sauce, remove the strings, arrange the olives on a dish, and pour gravy around them.

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. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + saucetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,078 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sauce + peppertop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,303 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together50,580 recipes

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

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Steak
Forms the outer wrap that holds the filling and becomes tender during slow simmering.
Egg
Binds the breadcrumb filling and gives the coating a set, golden structure.
Bacon
Adds fat and savory flavor that keeps the filling moist during cooking.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb fat and juices in the filling, helping it hold together and stay moist.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a smooth gravy.

The step that matters

Packing and tying the rolls. Rolls packed loosely or tied too loosely can unroll or open while simmering, letting filling escape. Tight, secure rolls keep the filling inside and the shape intact.

“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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