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Beef, Sausage Fashion

Beef slices stuffed with minced beef, herbs, and vegetables, rolled, tied, and stewed in broth and wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Beef, Sausage Fashion

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Cut the beef slice in half and flatten it.

  2. Mince the trimmed edges with suet, parsley, onion, mushroom, shallot, and basil.

  3. Mix the minced ingredients with egg yolks and ham (if using) to make a forcemeat.

Roll and stew

  1. Spread the forcemeat on the beef slices and roll them up like sausages.

  2. Tie the rolls with kitchen twine.

  3. Stew the rolls in broth, white wine, salt, pepper, clove‑studded onion, carrot, and parsnip.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Once cooked, strain the liquid, skim off the fat, and reduce it to a sauce consistency.

  2. Serve the sauce over the sausages or serve the sausages on a bed of sorrel or spinach.

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. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Parsley + basiltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,351 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  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

Beef
Forms the outer wrap and gives the rolls their meaty flavor and body.
Egg yolks
Bind the forcemeat so it holds together when rolled and stewed.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the forcemeat moist and rich during stewing.
Broth
Provides the cooking liquid that gently moistens and flavors the rolls and later the sauce.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma to the stewing liquid and the reduced sauce.
Parsley
Contributes fresh, herbal aroma to the forcemeat.

The step that matters

Skim off the fat and reduce the strained liquid. Fat left in the liquid can make the sauce greasy, while under-reducing leaves it thin and watery. Skimming removes loose fat, and gentle reduction concentrates flavor and thickens the liquid into a sauce.

Swap the basil

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, parsley, onion, mushroom, shallot, egg, ham):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Basilthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, parsley, onion, mushroom, shallot, egg, ham. 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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