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Beef a LA Mode

A braised beef dish with onions, carrots, and stock, finished with a brown sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Beef a LA Mode

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Trim, bone, and lard the beef.

  2. In a basin, combine the beef with claret (if using), lemon juice, chopped onion, clove, salt, pepper, and bouquet garni. Let it marinate for about 2 hours, basting frequently.

Brown and make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a stewpan, drain the beef, and fry it until browned.

  2. Lightly fry the button onions at the same time.

  3. Remove the beef and onions from the stewpan.

  4. Add the flour and fry until it turns nut-brown.

  5. Stir in the stock and the marinade, and bring to a boil.

Braise and serve

  1. Return the beef and onions to the stewpan, season to taste, and add the sliced carrot.

  2. Cook gently for 2 to 3 hours, stirring and skimming occasionally.

  3. When done, place on a hot dish, strain the sauce over, and garnish with groups of onions and carrot.

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  4. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Rump of beef
Forms the main meat that becomes tender during slow cooking.
Flour
Browned in the fat, it thickens the stock into a rich sauce.
Butter
Carries the frying so the beef and flour brown evenly.
Stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce and keeps the beef moist during braising.
Claret
Its acidity in the marinade helps tenderise the beef and adds flavour.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity to the marinade, which brightens the sauce and helps tenderise the meat.

The step that matters

Browning the flour. Frying the flour until nut-brown develops colour and a toasted flavour in the sauce. Stopping too early leaves it pale and floury, while burning it gives a bitter taste.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, flour, carrot, parsley, thyme, lemon):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, flour, carrot, parsley, thyme, lemon. 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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