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Stewed Beef and Parsnips

A simple stew of beef, parsnips, and potatoes simmered in salted water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsnip and potato work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 353 recipes. Both carry 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells green bell pepper, earthy. The science ↓

Stewed Beef and Parsnips

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the beef into chunks.

  2. Place the beef in a pot with enough water to cover.

Cook

  1. Add chopped parsnips and potatoes.

  2. Season with salt and pepper.

  3. Simmer until the beef is tender and the vegetables are cooked through.

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. Parsnip + potatotop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together353 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  2. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Parsnip + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,109 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Connective tissue breaks down during long simmering, giving the meat a tender texture.
Parsnips
Add natural sweetness and body to the broth as they soften.
Potatoes
Their starch softens and slightly thickens the liquid, adding body to the stew.

The step that matters

Simmer until the beef is tender. Tough beef needs a long, gentle simmer so its connective tissue can break down. Boiling hard can toughen the meat and make the liquid cloudy, so keep the pot at a slow simmer until the beef is tender.

Swap the parsnip

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Parsnipthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, potato, 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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