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Beef, a LA Mode

A slow‑cooked beef stew with bacon, carrots, onions, herbs, stock, and white wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Beef, a LA Mode

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Cook the beef

  1. Boil the beef for 1 hour, first quickly, then gently.

  2. Remove from heat and place in a 400°F (200°C) oven to stew for 5 to 6 hours.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove the fat and strain the sauce.

  2. Place the meat on a dish with the vegetables around it.

  3. Pour the sauce over the meat and serve.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Parsley + chivetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Long, slow cooking breaks down connective tissue, leaving the meat tender.
Bacon
Its rendered fat and salty, smoky flavour season the dish and the sauce.
Carrots
They add natural sweetness and body to the vegetables served around the meat.
Onions
They soften and sweeten as they cook, adding depth to the sauce.
White wine
It adds acidity and aroma, helping balance the richness of the braising liquid.
Stock
It supplies the liquid that gently cooks the beef and forms the base of the sauce.

The step that matters

Simmering gently after the initial boil. Once the beef has been boiled briefly, it must cook at a gentle heat. Vigorous boiling toughens muscle fibres and can make the meat stringy, while slow, low heat keeps it moist and tender.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, butter, carrot, parsley, chive, thyme):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Parsnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, butter, carrot, parsley, chive, thyme. 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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