Skip to main content
Main

Dutch, or Hung Beef

A preserved beef cured with saltpetre, sugar, salt, pepper, treacle, then smoked and boiled.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Dutch, or Hung Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Cure

  1. Mix saltpetre and coarse sugar.

  2. Rub all over the beef.

  3. Let it sit for 2 days.

  4. Add coarse sea salt, common salt, and ground black pepper.

  5. Rub thoroughly into the beef.

  6. After 4 days, pour treacle over the beef.

  7. Rub and turn daily for 14 days.

Dry and smoke

  1. Drain the beef.

  2. Send it to be smoked.

Cook and press

  1. Soak in cold water.

  2. Boil slowly.

  3. Press under a heavy weight while hot.

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

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

  2. Sugar + peppertop 32% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together19,401 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Beef + sugartop 37% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 19,401 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Provides the dense meat that the cure firms and the cooking tenderises.
Saltpetre
Gives the cured beef its pink colour and characteristic cured flavour.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the meat and seasons it during the cure.
Common salt
Adds to the salt penetrating the meat, seasoning and preserving it.
Treacle
Adds sweetness, dark colour and moisture to the cure.
Coarse sugar
Balances the saltiness and feeds surface browning and flavour.

The step that matters

Rub and turn daily for 14 days. Salt and cure penetrate meat slowly and unevenly, so turning and rubbing the beef each day spreads the cure and moisture. Skipping days can leave pockets of underseasoned or spoiling 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.

You might also like

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipesBeef BrothBeef Broth67 recipes