Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
Hashed Beef
Ingredients
Directions
Slice the beef and place it in a stewpan with the onion and a little water or stock.
Let it simmer.
Add a little flour to thicken, along with ketchup and other sauce.
Simmer for 15 minutes.
Serve with bread or toast snippets.
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.
Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it
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.
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Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,092 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,032 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
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Flour + ketchuptop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,435 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,676 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Onion + flourtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together32,460 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Beef
- Provides the main body of the hash and its savoury, meaty flavour.
- Flour
- Thickens the cooking liquid into a looser sauce that coats the beef.
- Ketchup
- Adds sweetness and acidity to the sauce, deepening its flavour.
- Onion
- Adds aromatic sweetness and softens into the simmering liquid.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, flour, ketchup, bread):
- Shallotfits better
- Leekfits better
- Turnipfits about as well
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beef, flour, ketchup, bread. 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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