Skip to main content
Main

Broiled Beef Steaks

Grilled beef steaks served with mushroom catsup, onion sauce, tomato sauce, oyster sauce, horseradish sauce, and brown cucumber sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Beef and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,232 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Broiled Beef Steaks

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Preheat the grill or broiler.

  2. Season the beef steaks with salt and pepper.

Cook and serve

  1. Place the steaks on the grill and broil for 8 to 10 minutes, turning once.

  2. If desired, place a thin slice of fresh butter under the steaks while cooking.

  3. Warm mushroom catsup in a heated dish to serve with the steaks.

  4. Optionally, rub the serving dish with a cut raw eschalot for added flavor.

  5. Serve immediately on hot plates.

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. Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  2. Onion + horseradishtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  4. Mushroom + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,719 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef steaks
The main protein, which browns on the surface and cooks through under direct heat.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and moisture as it melts over the steaks while they cook.

The step that matters

Broil for 8 to 10 minutes, turning once. Direct high heat browns the surface quickly while the interior cooks more slowly. Turning once gives even browning on both sides and helps prevent the outside from scorching before the centre is done.

Swap the horseradish

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, mushroom, onion, sauce, tomato, oyster):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Horseradishthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, mushroom, onion, sauce, tomato, oyster. 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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesRoast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCream of Tomato SoupCream of Tomato Soup107 recipes