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Stewed Sirloin of Beef

A slow‑cooked stew featuring sirloin, bacon, ham, neck beef, herbs, carrots, leeks, cloves, and peppercorns.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,310 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Stewed Sirloin of Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Remove the bones from the sirloin and reserve for another dish.

  2. Spread the meat flat and cover the inside with bacon slices.

  3. Season with salt, mace or nutmeg, and pepper.

  4. Roll and bind the meat firmly, then place it in a stewpan.

Stew

  1. Add enough beef broth to nearly cover the meat.

  2. Add slices of ham and the neck or stewing beef around the sirloin.

  3. Throw in the herbs, carrots, leeks, cloves, and peppercorns.

  4. Stew gently for 4 to 5 hours, or longer if needed.

Finish

  1. Adjust seasoning before serving and reduce the cooking liquid if necessary.

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Pepper + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  5. Leek + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together579 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

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

What each ingredient does

Sirloin of beef
Forms the main meat, which becomes tender through long, gentle stewing.
Striped bacon
Adds fat and savoury flavour that seasons the lean sirloin from within as it cooks.
Beef broth
Provides the cooking liquid that gently braises the meat and builds a savoury sauce.
Carrots
Add sweetness and body to the cooking liquid as they soften.
Leeks
Contribute mild onion-like aroma and sweetness to the stewing liquid.
Neck or stewing beef
Adds collagen-rich meat that becomes gelatinous and enriches the broth during long cooking.

The step that matters

Stew gently for 4 to 5 hours. Gentle, prolonged heat is needed to break down connective tissue so the meat turns tender. Boiling vigorously toughens muscle fibres and can make the meat dry and stringy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, ham, carrot, leek, clove):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, ham, carrot, leek, clove. 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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