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Common Gravy

A simple beef gravy made with butter, suet, onions, beef, broth, carrots, celery, and cloves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Common Gravy

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pan

  1. Spread butter on the bottom of a medium-sized stewpan.

  2. Cover with thin slices of beef suet.

  3. Add slices of onions on top.

  4. Place the beef slices and any leftover meat in the stewpan.

Make the gravy

  1. Moisten with 1 quart of common broth.

  2. Set over high heat to boil.

  3. When the broth reduces to a glaze, lower the heat.

  4. Allow the gravy to develop a deep red-brown color.

  5. Fill the stewpan with more broth or water.

  6. Garnish with carrots, celery, and cloves.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  4. Celery + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-decalactone (peach, creamy).

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 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
Provides the meat flavor and body of the gravy as it browns and releases its juices.
Beef suet
Adds fat that coats the pan and enriches the gravy's flavor and mouthfeel.
Butter
Adds fat that helps the onions and meat start to brown on the pan bottom.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma as they soften and brown in the pan.
Common broth
Supplies liquid that reduces to a glaze and then forms the body of the gravy.

The step that matters

Reducing the broth to a glaze. If the broth reduces too far or the heat stays high, the glaze can scorch before the meat and onions brown evenly. Lowering the heat at the right moment lets the browned fond build deep color without burning.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, beef, onion, carrot, celery):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, beef, onion, carrot, celery. 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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