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Tenderloin of Beef

A beef stew of tenderloin with vegetables, allspice, butter, and fried meatballs served in gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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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 ↓

Tenderloin of Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef and vegetables

  1. Remove the whole tenderloin from the hind quarter before cutting it out.

  2. Wash the tenderloin and place it in an oven with 1 pint of water.

  3. Chop the potatoes, carrots, turnips, and celery, then add them to the meat.

  4. Let the mixture simmer slowly.

Finish the stew

  1. When nearly done, add 1 teaspoon of pounded allspice and 1 tablespoon of butter.

  2. If the gravy is too greasy, skim off some melted fat.

Make the force-meat balls

  1. Boil the lean piece of beef until fully cooked, then chop finely.

  2. Mix the chopped beef with a small amount of onion, salt, and pepper.

  3. Form the mixture into small balls, wet them with eggs, and roll in breadcrumbs.

  4. Fry the balls until light brown.

Serve

  1. Serve the tenderloin surrounded by the force-meat balls and pour the gravy over the dish.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Turnip + celerytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Potato + carrottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef tenderloin
Forms the main meat, becoming tender and juicy as it simmers slowly in liquid.
Potatoes
Break down while simmering, thickening the gravy and adding body to the stew.
Carrots
Add sweetness and body to the gravy as they soften during simmering.
Turnips
Contribute mild sweetness and soft texture to the stew as they cook.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the finished gravy.
Eggs
Act as a binder and glue for the breadcrumb coating on the balls.

The step that matters

Skimming the gravy. Fat rises and pools on the surface of a simmering stew, so a greasy gravy can taste heavy. Skimming off the melted fat before adding butter keeps the sauce balanced and clean-tasting.

Swap the allspice

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, potato, carrot, turnip, celery, butter, onion):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Allspicethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, potato, carrot, turnip, celery, butter, onion. 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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