Name: Hashed Beef
Ingredients: 1 pound beef, cut into small thin slices; 2 teaspoons flour; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt (formerly 'bay salt'); ⅓ cup mushroom ketchup; ½ cup gravy or water; Dry toast, for serving

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 ↓

Hashed Beef

Ingredients

1 pound beef, cut into small thin slices
2 teaspoons flour
¼ teaspoon pepper
¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt (formerly 'bay salt')
⅓ cup mushroom ketchup
½ cup gravy or water
Dry toast, for serving

Directions

In a stewpan, combine the beef slices, flour, pepper, and salt, then shake everything together.
Add the mushroom ketchup and gravy or water.
Stir over medium heat for a few minutes until hot.
Serve with dry toast around the hash.

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.

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.

Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,232 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Flour + ketchuptop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,435 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Mushroom + ketchuptop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,225 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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, cooked gently in the sauce until hot and tender.
Flour: Thickens the liquid into a light sauce that clings to the beef slices.
Mushroom ketchup: Adds savory, umami depth to the sauce.

“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.