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Stewed Rump Another Way

A stew of beef rump simmered with wine, beer, herbs, and optional mushrooms, truffles, morels, oysters, and forcemeat balls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Stewed Rump Another Way

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Half-roast the beef.

  2. Place it in a large pot with water, small beer, port wine, salt, vinegar, catsup, sweet herbs, onions, cloves, and cayenne.

  3. Cover and simmer for 2-3 hours until tender.

Finish the gravy

  1. Transfer the beef to a deep dish, set it over hot water, and cover it.

  2. Skim the gravy, adding pickled mushrooms, truffles, morels, and oysters if desired.

  3. Thicken the gravy with flour and butter, heat it, and pour it over the beef.

  4. For added flavor, include forcemeat balls.

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. Thyme + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Basil + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together688 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  3. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Tarragon + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together148 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef rump (in the method)
Provides the meat that becomes tender through long, slow simmering.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so it coats the beef rather than running thin.
Butter
Enriches the thickened gravy with fat and a smoother texture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the gravy and balances the rich wine and beer.
Port wine
Adds depth, sweetness and color to the braising liquid.

The step that matters

Simmer gently until tender. Keeping the liquid at a slow simmer lets tough connective tissue in the rump break down into gelatin. A hard boil toughens and dries the meat, so the beef stays firm and stringy.

Swap the basil

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beer, port wine, vinegar, tarragon, parsley, thyme, marjoram):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Sagefits about as well
  3. Basilthe original
  4. Allspicefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beer, port wine, vinegar, tarragon, parsley, thyme, marjoram. 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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