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Rump Steak Pie

A savory pie filled with diced rump steak, shallots, pepper, salt, mushroom ketchup, and gravy or red wine, topped with pie crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,982 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Rump Steak Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the rump steak into pieces half the size of your hand, trimming off skin and sinews.

  2. Chop the shallots very finely and mix with the pepper and salt.

Assemble and bake

  1. Strew some of the mixture at the bottom of a dish, then add a layer of steak, followed by more seasoning, repeating until the dish is full.

  2. Add the mushroom ketchup and gravy or red wine.

  3. Cover with pie crust and bake for 2 hours.

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. Shallot + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Mushroom + red winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together720 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + shallottop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Shallot + red winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together231 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Rump steak
Provides the meat that becomes tender during the long slow bake.
Shallots
Add savoury sweetness and aroma as they soften into the filling.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds concentrated savoury depth and umami to the filling.
Gravy or red wine
Supplies liquid that moistens the meat and builds the sauce as it cooks.

The step that matters

Cover with pie crust and bake for 2 hours. Rump steak is a tough cut, and a long, gentle bake with enough liquid breaks down its connective tissue. Baking too hot or too briefly can leave the meat chewy and the filling thin.

Swap the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, mushroom, ketchup, red wine):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Shallotthe original
  4. Carrotfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mushroom, ketchup, red wine. 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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