Name: Braised Beef in Honey & Soy
Prep time: 30 min
Yield: Serves 6
Ingredients: 2 tbsp vegetable oil; 1½kg braising beef , preferably 2 large beef cheeks, trimmed and halved; 1 onion , roughly chopped; 1 carrot , roughly chopped; 1 leek , roughly chopped; 1 celery stick, roughly chopped; 2 garlic cloves; small bunch thyme; 5 coriander seeds; 2 cloves; 50ml sherry vinegar; 60ml soy sauce; 200ml Madeira; 3 tbsp clear honey; 1 tbsp tomato purée; 800ml chicken stock; 3 heads bok choi , quartered; 2 tbsp olive oil; 2 tsp soy sauce; 1 tbsp icing sugar; small piece ginger; 100ml chicken stock

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 ↓

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.

Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,173 recipes

Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).
Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together29,058 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Leek + thymetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together360 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together4,108 recipes

Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).
Carrot + leektop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,310 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, onion, carrot, leek, celery, garlic, thyme):

Parsleyfits better
Marjoramfits better
Winter savoryfits better
Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, onion, carrot, leek, celery, garlic, thyme. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Beef	100g cooked	250
Chicken	100g cooked	165
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Honey	1 tbsp (21g)	64
Sugar	1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated	49
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Carrot	1 medium (61g)	25
Wine	2 tbsp cooking wine (30ml)	25
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Soy Sauce	1 tbsp (15ml)	9
Clove	1 tsp ground (2g)	7
Celery	1 stalk (40g)	6
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Thyme	1 tsp dried (1.4g)	4
Vinegar	1 tbsp (15ml) distilled	3
Ginger	1 tsp grated fresh (2g)	2
Coriander	not in our table	0
Seed	not in our table	0

Braised Beef in Honey & Soy