Skip to main content
Main

Collared Beef

A preserved beef cured with salt, pepper, treacle, and boiled after curing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Collared Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Cure the beef

  1. Mix saltpetre, black pepper, coarse sea salt, and common salt.

  2. Rub the mixture into the beef and let it cure for 4 days, turning daily.

  3. After 4 days, add treacle and continue curing for another 4 to 6 days.

Prepare and cook

  1. Dip the beef in water.

  2. Remove bones and skin.

  3. Roll and bind tightly.

  4. Place the rolled beef in cold water and boil for 3.5 hours.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 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

Thin flank beef
Provides the meat that becomes the collar, with lean fibres that firm up when cooked.
Saltpetre
Helps the beef keep its pink colour during the long cure.
Common salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat as it cures.
Treacle
Adds sweetness and a deep flavour to the cure.

The step that matters

Rolling and binding tightly before boiling. A loose roll can open up or uneven pieces may form during boiling. Tight binding keeps the meat compact so it cooks evenly and slices neatly.

“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.

You might also like

Roast BeefRoast Beef211 recipesBeef LoafBeef Loaf175 recipesCorned BeefCorned Beef87 recipesBeef BrothBeef Broth67 recipes