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Boiled Beef

A boiled beef with turnips, carrots, onions, leeks, and poultry or game bones, served with parsley or sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Boiled Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Bone and tie the rump of beef together neatly.

  2. Place it in a pot with any odd bits of butcher's meat and bones.

Boil

  1. Fill the pot with water, not quite full, and place it on a moderate fire.

  2. Skim the surface gently as it begins to boil.

  3. After a short time, add salt, turnips, carrots, onions, and leeks.

  4. Let it boil gently until the beef is fully cooked.

Serve

  1. Remove the beef and serve with fresh parsley, sauce, or vegetables.

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. Turnip + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Turnip + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Carrot + leektop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,310 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Onion + leektop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,326 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl butyrate (apple, fruity).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Rump of beef
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender and juicy as it cooks slowly in water.
Bones and poultry or game parts
Release gelatin and flavour into the broth, adding body to the liquid.
Turnips
Absorb flavour from the broth and add a mild sweetness as they soften.
Carrots
Release natural sugars during gentle boiling, adding sweetness and colour.
Onions
Contribute savoury depth and aroma to the broth as they cook down.
Leeks
Soften and add a mild oniony sweetness to the broth and vegetables.

The step that matters

Skim the surface gently as it begins to boil. Scum and fat rising to the surface can cloud the broth and taste greasy. Skimming early keeps the liquid clear, and a gentle boil keeps the meat tender rather than tough.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, meat, turnip, carrot, onion, leek):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, meat, turnip, carrot, onion, leek. 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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