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Fillet of Beef Stewed

A stew of rolled beef fillet with ham, vegetables, herbs, and pickle, simmered and browned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Fillet of Beef Stewed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Roll the inside sirloin of beef with the fat in the center.

  2. Add the stock and slices of lean ham to a stewpan.

  3. Place the rolled beef in the stewpan and cover with diced carrots, celery, small onions, savory herbs, and chopped pickle.

  4. Season with salt, pepper, mace, and a little ketchup.

Cook and serve

  1. Simmer until tender, then brown the beef before the fire.

  2. Skim and season the sauce, remove the herbs, and 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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Celery + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together16,012 recipes

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

  3. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

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

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Inside sirloin of beef
Forms the main body of the stew and becomes tender through slow simmering.
Lean ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour to the stock.
Carrots
Add sweetness and body to the sauce as they cook.
Celery
Adds aromatic, savoury depth to the sauce.
Ketchup
Adds tangy acidity and a little sweetness to the sauce.

The step that matters

Simmer until tender, then brown the beef before the fire. Simmering slowly breaks down connective tissue in the lean meat, so it must cook long enough to become tender. Browning afterward adds colour and roasted flavour to the surface, which the moist cooking does not produce.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, ham, carrot, celery, onion, pepper, ketchup):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, ham, carrot, celery, onion, pepper, ketchup. 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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