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Hamburg Steak

A ground beef patty seasoned with salt, pepper, sage, onion juice, and coated in flour, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Hamburg Steak

Why it works: Pepper and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Hamburg Steak

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Finely chop the beef.

  2. Season the beef with salt, pepper, sage, and onion juice.

Shape and cook

  1. Form the mixture into small cakes.

  2. Coat each cake in flour.

  3. Fry the cakes in a skillet until cooked through.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Sage + oniontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,628 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Lean raw beef
Forms the main body of the cakes and provides the meaty flavor and texture.
Flour
Forms a coating that helps the outside of each cake brown when fried.
Dried sage
Adds an aromatic herbal flavor that seasons the beef.

The step that matters

Fry the cakes in a skillet until cooked through. Ground or finely chopped raw beef must reach a safe internal temperature throughout. Frying until cooked through, with the flour coating browning on the outside, ensures the centre is done without drying the exterior too much.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, sage, 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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