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Grilled Steak and Olives

Grilled steak served with a buttered olive mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Olive and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 30,263 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Grilled Steak and Olives

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the steak

  1. Cut the steak to ½ inch thick, either in pieces or left whole.

  2. Melt half the butter and dip the steak in it on both sides.

Cook the steak

  1. Heat a grill and rub the grill bars with a bit of suet.

  2. Place the steak on the grill over a hot fire for 8 minutes, turning every minute.

  3. Remove the steak when it is slightly underdone and place it on a hot dish.

  4. Sprinkle with pepper and coarse sea salt, and spread a bit of the remaining butter on top.

Prepare the olives and serve

  1. Stone the olives by making an incision with a sharp knife and soaking them in water for an hour.

  2. Chop and par-boil the olives in stock for 20 minutes, then drain and pound with the remaining butter.

  3. Place the olive mixture on top of the steak and serve hot.

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. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

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

  2. Butter + olivetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,887 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Steak
Provides the main meaty structure and texture of the dish, cooked quickly over high heat.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, coating the steak and carrying flavour and moisture into the dish.
Olives
Contribute briny, savoury flavour and a soft, moist texture when chopped and pounded with butter.

The step that matters

Removing the steak while slightly underdone. Meat keeps cooking from its own residual heat after leaving the grill and while it rests on a hot dish. Taking it off just before the desired doneness keeps the centre juicy instead of dry and overcooked.

“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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