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Spanish Steaks

A steak dish with onion, beef dripping, stock, butter, vinegar, and cream, garnished with parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tarragon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,563 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Spanish Steaks

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the steaks

  1. Cut the steak into rounds and score them with a knife.

  2. Sprinkle parsley on top of each round, then drizzle with melted butter and vinegar.

Fry the onion

  1. Let the steak marinate while frying the sliced onion in beef dripping.

  2. Strain the onions and ensure no dripping remains in the pan.

Simmer and serve

  1. Cover the bottom of the pan with hot stock and gently simmer the steaks for one hour.

  2. Remove the lid and boil the gravy until reduced to about ¾ cup.

  3. Pour the gravy around the steaks and garnish with parsley, adding the onions just before serving.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Tarragon + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Rump steak
Forms the main meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle simmering.
Onion
Frying softens it and brings sweetness and aroma to the gravy.
Beef dripping
Adds fat and savory flavor, and helps the onion brown while frying.
Brown stock
Provides the cooking liquid that becomes the gravy, adding savory depth.
Melted butter
Adds richness and a smooth, rounded flavor to the steaks.
Tarragon vinegar
Adds acidity and a sharp, herbal note that brightens the rich meat.

The step that matters

Simmer the steaks gently for one hour. A gentle simmer lets connective tissue in tougher cuts break down slowly and keeps the meat tender. A hard boil tightens the muscle fibres and toughens the steak, and it can also reduce the liquid too quickly.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, beef, butter, tarragon, vinegar, cream):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Celeryfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, beef, butter, tarragon, vinegar, cream. 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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