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Sirloin of Beef Roasted

A roasted sirloin of beef stuffed with suet, breadcrumbs, lemon peel, thyme, shallot, and port wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and horseradish match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 376 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Sirloin of Beef Roasted

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sirloin

  1. Break the upper part of the chine-bones.

  2. Cut the broken bones out.

  3. Skewer the bones in place to prevent them from drawing up.

  4. Run a spit just under the bark at the thin end.

  5. Bring the spit out between the joints.

  6. Cover the fat with buttered paper.

  7. Lift the fat from the inside of the sirloin with a sharp knife.

  8. Remove the meat close to the bone.

Make the stuffing

  1. Finely chop the removed meat and mix it with suet, bread crumbs, lemon peel, thyme, shallot, and port wine.

  2. Put the mixture back into the sirloin.

  3. Cover it with the skin and fat.

  4. Skewer it down neatly.

Roast and serve

  1. Roast gently for 3 to 4 hours.

  2. Cover the joint with paper while roasting.

  3. Do not remove the paper until the joint is served.

  4. Garnish with scraped horseradish.

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. Shallot + horseradishtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together376 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  3. Thyme + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Lemon + shallottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Sirloin of beef
Forms the main joint that is stuffed and roasted as the dish.
Suet
Adds fat to the stuffing, keeping it moist and rich during roasting.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and fat, giving the stuffing body and a soft texture.
Port wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the stuffing.
Shallot
Adds mild savoury aroma to the stuffing.

The step that matters

Cover the joint with paper while roasting. Keeping the paper on the joint and only removing it at service helps the fat and stuffing stay moist and protects the surface from drying and over-browning during the long, gentle roast.

Swap the horseradish

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, bread, lemon, thyme, shallot, port wine, butter):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Arrowrootfits better
  4. Horseradishthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, bread, lemon, thyme, shallot, port wine, butter. 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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