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To Salt Beef

A method of curing beef with salt, sugar, mace, suet, and optional ingredients, then baking and using the resulting jelly in soups.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,969 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

To Salt Beef

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Cure the beef

  1. Rub the beef all over with mace.

  2. Add common salt and coarse sugar to the beef.

  3. Let the beef sit in this mixture for 14 days, turning and rubbing it daily.

  4. Cover the beef with spices and chopped sweet herbs.

Roll and bake

  1. Roll the beef tightly.

  2. Tie it with tape.

  3. Place the beef in a pan with water and suet.

  4. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for 6 hours.

Cool and finish

  1. Put a heavy weight on the beef while cooling.

  2. Remove the tape.

  3. Clear the jelly from the pan of fat.

  4. Mix the jelly with an equal portion of jelly from an ox-foot for use in soups.

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. Beef + macetop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,969 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Sugar + macetop 34% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,096 recipes
  3. Beef + sugartop 37% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Forms the main body of the dish, firming as it cooks and cools.
Common salt
Draws moisture out of the meat and seasons it through the long cure.
Coarse sugar
Balances the saltiness and adds a mild sweetness to the meat.
Suet
Adds fat that helps keep the meat moist during the long bake.
Mace
Adds a warm, aromatic flavour to the surface of the beef.
Saltpetre
Helps preserve the cured meat and supports its colour.

The step that matters

Turning and rubbing the beef daily during the 14-day cure. Salt and sugar penetrate the meat slowly and unevenly. Daily turning redistributes the cure so that moisture is drawn out evenly and the meat is seasoned and preserved throughout rather than just at the surface.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, sugar):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Gingerfits better
  3. Pepperfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, sugar. 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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