Why it works: Beef and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 37% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,435 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Cured Brisket of Beef for Christmas
Ingredients
Directions
Cure
Rub the brisket of beef with saltpetre at night.
Mix sugar and coarse sea salt, then rub the mixture over the beef.
Let the beef sit in the pickle for two weeks, turning and rubbing it daily.
Bake
Place the beef in an earthen pan with chopped suet on the bottom and top.
Add a little water to prevent burning, then bake slowly for six hours.
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.
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Beef + sugartop 37% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together5,435 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Brisket of beef
- Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender during slow cooking.
- Saltpetre
- Helps the meat keep its pink colour during the cure.
- Sugar
- Balances the salt and adds sweetness to the cured meat.
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during curing.
- Suet
- Adds fat that bastes the beef and keeps it moist while baking.
The step that matters
Bake slowly with water in the pan. Slow, gentle heat with a little added water keeps the beef from drying out or scorching, while letting the tough connective tissue soften into tender meat.
“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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