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Savoury Salt Beef Baked

This recipe uses saltpetre, which should be handled with care.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,620 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Savoury Salt Beef Baked

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Hang the beef for 2 to 3 days.

  2. In a bowl, combine saltpetre, coarse sugar, black pepper, allspice, ginger (if using), minced herbs, and common salt.

  3. Pound the ingredients together until well mixed.

  4. Rub the mixture thoroughly over the beef.

  5. Allow the beef to cure for a period before baking.

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. Allspice + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,620 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pepper + gingertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,800 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Beef + gingertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,410 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

Swap the ginger

The recipe marks ginger as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, sugar, pepper, allspice):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Gingerthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, sugar, pepper, allspice. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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