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Potted Beef

A preserved beef dish made by slow cooking, seasoning, and packing in small pots with clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,331 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Potted Beef

Oven, in the book's wordsA very slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Cure the beef

  1. Rub the beef with salt, saltpetre, and sugar; let it sit for 2 days, turning and rubbing twice daily.

Bake

  1. Place the beef in a jar with ½ pint of water; cover with its fat or suet, and seal with a layer of paste.

  2. Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for 4-5 hours or overnight.

Pot and store

  1. Drain the gravy, remove skin and gristle, and finely pound or mince the meat.

  2. Gradually mix in ½ pound of softened butter and season with spices to taste.

  3. Press the mixture into small pots and cover with clarified butter or salad oil; seal with a bladder.

  4. For long storage, stack pots in sand to exclude air.

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. Allspice + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Allspice + macetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef
Forms the bulk of the potted meat, giving its texture once pounded and bound with butter.
Saltpetre
Cures the meat, helping it keep its pink colour and resist spoilage during storage.
Salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the meat during the curing rub.
Fresh butter
Binds the pounded meat into a smooth spread and adds richness and moisture.

The step that matters

Sealing the jar before baking. A tight seal with the fat or suet and paste traps moisture so the meat cooks gently in its own juices. A loose seal lets it dry out during the long, slow bake.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, sugar, butter, pepper, allspice, nutmeg, ham):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, sugar, butter, pepper, allspice, nutmeg, 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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