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Stewed Steak

A slow‑cooked steak simmered in a buttery gravy with vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Ketchup and sauce match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,099 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Stewed Steak

Ingredients

Directions

Brown the steak

  1. Heat the butter in a stewpan until hot.

  2. Fry the steak on both sides until nicely browned.

  3. Lift the steak out of the pan with a knife without piercing it.

  4. Stir the flour into the butter.

  5. Add enough stock to cover the steak and stir until boiling.

  6. Return the steak to the pan and simmer very slowly for about 1.5 hours until tender.

Prepare the vegetables

  1. Cook the diced vegetables separately.

Season and serve

  1. Place the cooked steak on a hot dish.

  2. Arrange the cooked vegetables around the steak.

  3. Add salt, pepper, ketchup, Harvey's Sauce, and browning to the gravy.

  4. Pour the gravy over the steak and vegetables.

  5. Serve 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. Ketchup + saucetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Pepper + celerytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Steak
Slow simmering in stock breaks down connective tissue, making the meat tender.
Flour
Stirred into the hot butter, it thickens the stock into a gravy.
Butter
Carries the heat for browning the steak and adds richness to the gravy.
Onion
Diced and cooked alongside the steak, it adds sweetness and savoury aroma to the dish.
Carrot
Diced and cooked alongside the steak, it adds natural sweetness and body.

The step that matters

Simmering the steak very slowly. Gentle heat over a long time softens the tough connective tissue. A rapid boil toughens the meat's proteins and can leave it dry and stringy.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, pepper, ketchup, sauce, turnip, celery):

  1. Leekfits about as well
  2. Horseradishfits about as well
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, pepper, ketchup, sauce, turnip, 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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