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Beef-olives

Beef slices rolled with breadcrumbs, shallot, suet, pepper, and salt, stewed in gravy until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef-olives

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lay the forcemeat of bread crumbs, shallot, suet, pepper, and salt on the beef slices.

  2. Roll the slices and secure them with a small skewer.

Stew

  1. Place them in a stew pan with gravy and a spoonful or two of water.

  2. Stew until tender.

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 + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Shallot + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

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

  3. Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Bread + shallottop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,245 recipes

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

  5. Beef + shallottop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,103 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef slices
Form the wrapper that encloses the filling and becomes tender through slow stewing.
Bread crumbs
Bind the forcemeat and absorb fat and juices, keeping the filling moist.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the forcemeat moist and rich during stewing.
Gravy from beef bones or meat
Supplies the liquid for stewing, adding meaty flavor and moisture to the beef.

The step that matters

Stew until tender. Beef needs long, gentle moist heat to break down connective tissue. Stewing too hard or too briefly leaves the meat tough, so keep it at a bare simmer with enough liquid.

Swap the shallot

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

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Carrotfits better
  4. Shallotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, bread, pepper. 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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