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Stewed Bump

A stew of beef rump simmered with water, beer, port wine, vinegar, ketchup, herbs, onions, cloves, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Stewed Bump

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Half-roast the beef rump.

Make the stew

  1. Place it in a large pot with water, small beer, port wine, salt, vinegar, ketchup, and sweet herbs.

  2. Add onions, cloves, and a pinch of Cayenne pepper.

  3. Cover the pot tightly and simmer until tender.

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. Tarragon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together528 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Tarragon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Vinegar + tarragontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Beer + port winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together45 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl isobutyrate (fruity, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef rump
Main meat that becomes tender and flavourful during long, slow simmering.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the braising liquid.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the rich, slow-cooked liquid.
Ketchup
Adds sweetness, acidity and savoury depth to the braising liquid.
Onions
Soften during simmering and add sweetness and savoury body to the stew.

The step that matters

Cover the pot tightly and simmer until tender. Gentle, covered simmering keeps the liquid from evaporating and lets collagen in the tough rump break down slowly into gelatin. Boiling hard toughens the meat's proteins and leaves it dry and stringy, so keep the heat low and steady.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, beer, port wine, vinegar, ketchup, tarragon, thyme):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Allspicefits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Celeryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, beer, port wine, vinegar, ketchup, tarragon, 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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