Name: Rump Steak Pie
Ingredients: 2 pounds rump steak; Coarse sea salt; Black pepper; Flour; ⅓ cup water; ¾ pound pie crust

Why it works: Pepper and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 50,459 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Rump Steak Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

Cut the rump steak into thin slices.
Season the slices with coarse sea salt and black pepper.
Dip each piece into flour and place them in a small pie dish, forming a dome shape on top.
Add ⅓ cup of water to the dish.

Assemble and bake

Cover with ¾ pound of pie crust and brush the top with egg.
Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) until golden brown.
Serve hot or cold.

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.

Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Rump steak: Forms the meat filling, which softens into tender pieces as it cooks slowly under the crust.
Flour: Coats the meat and thickens the cooking liquid into a light gravy.
Pie crust: Encloses the filling and browns in the oven, giving the pie its structure.

“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.