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Stewed Brisket of Beef, a LA Flamande

A slow‑cooked beef brisket with carrots, onion, celery, herbs, and spices, glazed and served with Brussels sprouts, glazed onions, and sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 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 Brisket of Beef, a LA Flamande

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Trim the brisket of beef, removing the breast-bone and rough parts.

  2. Place the brisket in a large braising pan and garnish with carrots, onion, celery, parsley, green onions, thyme, bay leaf, cloves, and mace.

  3. Add enough broth to cover the beef and bring to a gentle boil.

Braise and glaze

  1. Simmer for about 5 hours until tender.

  2. Drain the brisket and place it on a baking sheet, adding a little broth underneath.

  3. Glaze the brisket and place it in a 400°F (200°C) oven to dry, glazing again as needed.

Serve

  1. Serve the brisket garnished with turned carrots, turnips, Brussels sprouts, and glazed onions, and sauce with Espagnole or Poivrade sauce.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Thyme + clovetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef brisket
Long gentle simmering breaks down connective tissue, leaving the meat tender and moist.
Broth
Keeps the meat moist during braising and forms the base for the cooking liquid.
Carrots
Add sweetness and aroma to the braising liquid and the finished dish.
Onion
Adds savoury depth and aroma to the braising liquid.
Sugar
Caramelises on the surface during glazing, adding colour and a glossy browned finish.

The step that matters

Glazing and drying in the oven. Brushing the surface with glaze and drying it at high heat lets sugars caramelise and brown without overcooking the meat. Glazing repeatedly builds a glossy, flavourful crust, while too much heat or too long a time can dry the surface out.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, carrot, onion, celery, parsley, thyme, clove):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, carrot, onion, celery, parsley, thyme, clove. 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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