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Beefsteak Pie

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beefsteak Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

  1. Cut the steak into 2-inch long and 1-inch wide strips.

  2. Stew the steak with the bone in enough water to cover until partly cooked.

  3. Slice the cold boiled potatoes.

  4. Line a baking dish with pie paste.

  5. Layer the meat with salt, pepper, and thinly sliced onion.

  6. Add a layer of sliced potatoes with bits of butter.

  7. Repeat layers of steak and potatoes until the dish is full.

  8. Thicken the gravy or broth with brown flour and add it to the dish.

  9. Cover with a top crust, making a slit in the middle, and brush with beaten egg.

  10. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until golden brown.

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

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

  2. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, pepper, butter, flour, egg):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, pepper, butter, flour, egg. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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