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Curried Cold Beef

A curry of cold beef with apple, onions, bacon, and lemon, served over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Curried Cold Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Fry the bacon squares in a pan until crispy.

  2. Add the sliced onions and cook until soft.

  3. In a bowl, mix the flour, curry powder, curry paste, and grated apple.

  4. Add the mixture to the pan and stir well.

  5. Gradually add the water, stirring until boiling.

Cook and serve

  1. Once slightly cooled, add the beef cut into pieces.

  2. Let simmer for 30 minutes.

  3. Just before serving, stir in the lemon juice.

  4. Serve with boiled rice.

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 + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Apple + lemontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,551 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Onion + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Apple + oniontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,206 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cold beef
Provides the main protein, which becomes tender during the simmer.
Sour apple
Adds tartness and body to the sauce as it breaks down.
Curry powder
Supplies the main spiced aroma and flavour of the curry.
Flour
Thickens the sauce as it cooks with the liquid.
Bacon fat
Carries the spices and adds savoury richness to the base.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the finished curry.

The step that matters

Adding the water to the flour mixture. Adding liquid gradually while stirring keeps the flour smooth and lump-free, so the sauce thickens evenly instead of clumping.

Swap the apple

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

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Raisinfits better
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, onion, lemon, flour. 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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