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Devilled Meat

A baked dish of cold meat slices topped with a mustard, vinegar, and gravy mixture.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Devilled Meat

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the sauce

  1. Mix mustard with vinegar in a bowl.

  2. Gradually add oil, butter, curry powder, Worcestershire sauce, vinegar, and lemon juice, mixing thoroughly.

  3. Pour in the gravy and stir well.

Bake and serve

  1. Place slices of underdone meat in a pie dish and pour the mixture over them.

  2. Cover with a plate and bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 10 minutes, stirring frequently.

  3. Serve with mashed potatoes.

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. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Mustard + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,816 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Mustard + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,120 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Mustard + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together855 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Sauce + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sauce and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that cuts through the richness of the butter and meat.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the sauce and balances the fat.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, giving the sauce a smooth, rounded texture.
Curry powder
Adds warm aroma and spice that defines the deviled flavour.
Gravy
Adds moisture and savoury body, turning the mixture into a pourable sauce.
Worcestershire sauce
Adds savoury depth and umami that rounds out the spiced sauce.

The step that matters

Covering and stirring during the short bake. The meat is already underdone and the bake is brief at high heat. Covering traps steam to heat the meat gently and keep the sauce from reducing too fast, while stirring spreads heat evenly so the sauce does not scorch at the edges before the meat is heated through.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mustard, sauce, vinegar, butter, meat):

  1. Avocadofits better
  2. Coconutfits about as well
  3. Grapefits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mustard, sauce, vinegar, butter, meat. 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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