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Beefsteak with Oysters

A beefsteak stuffed with a buttery oyster mixture, grilled and served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Beefsteak with Oysters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Remove gills from oysters and chop them.

  2. Mix chopped oysters with melted butter, seasonings, and enough breadcrumbs to absorb the moisture.

Stuff the steak

  1. Make a slit in the steak from the side with a small knife, cutting through the middle within an inch of the edge all around.

  2. Fill the slit with the oyster mixture and sew or skewer it neatly.

Grill and serve

  1. Brush the steak with melted butter and grill for 20 minutes.

  2. Serve on a very hot dish with potato chips.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Butter + oystertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Pepper + oystertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,663 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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 body of the dish and carries the stuffing.
Breadcrumbs
Absorb the moisture from the oysters so the stuffing holds together.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and helps the surface brown while grilling.
Oysters
Provide the briny, savoury flavour of the stuffing.

The step that matters

Fill the slit with the oyster mixture and sew or skewer it neatly.. A loose or poorly closed pocket lets the stuffing leak out and dry or burn on the grill. Keeping the mixture just moist enough, not wet, helps it stay in place during cooking.

“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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