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Beef, Fillet Of, with Tomatoes

Beef fillet cooked with tomatoes, onions, herbs, and a stock reduction.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Beef, Fillet Of, with Tomatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Trim and bind the fillet into a good shape.

  2. Heat the butter in a stewpan.

Brown and braise

  1. Add the fillet and fry until browned on all sides.

  2. Add the onion, parsley, herbs, and a pinch of pepper.

  3. Cover and cook slowly for 2 hours, basting frequently.

Make the sauce

  1. Boil the stock.

  2. Mix the flour with a little cold stock or water.

  3. Pour the mixture into the hot stock and simmer for 10 minutes.

Finish

  1. An hour before serving, pour the stock mixture into the stewpan with the meat.

  2. Bake or stuff the tomatoes as desired.

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 + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  3. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  4. Beef + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,448 recipes

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

  5. Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 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

Beef fillet
Forms the main body of the dish, tenderised by slow, moist cooking.
Butter
Fat that carries heat for browning the fillet and adds richness.
Onion
Softens and sweetens as it cooks, adding aroma to the braising liquid.
Flour
Starch that thickens the stock into a sauce when heated.
Beef stock
Braising liquid that keeps the meat moist and forms the sauce.
Tomatoes
Add acidity and juiciness that brighten the rich beef.

The step that matters

Mix the flour with cold liquid before adding it to the hot stock. Flour starch dispersed in cold liquid first stays separate, so it thickens smoothly; dropped dry into hot stock it forms lumps that are hard to remove.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, parsley, onion, flour, 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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