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Stewed Beef and Rice

A simple stew of beef and rice cooked with onions, herbs, vinegar, and hot water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stewed Beef and Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the beef into nice pieces and dip them in vinegar.

  2. Place the beef in a stewpan or jar with the sliced onion and herbs.

  3. Pour the hot water over the ingredients and cover closely.

Stew and serve

  1. Stew for 2 to 4 hours, or until the beef is tender.

  2. Wash the rice and add it during the last hour of cooking.

  3. Stir often to prevent burning and season to taste just before serving.

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 + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,433 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

  4. Beef + ricetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,265 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Leg of beef
Becomes tender during slow stewing, providing the main body of the dish.
Rice
Absorbs liquid and thickens the stew as it cooks.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savoury depth to the stewing liquid.
Vinegar
Acidity helps soften the surface of the beef before stewing.

The step that matters

Stir often to prevent burning. With long, gentle stewing and little liquid, sugars and starches can scorch on the base of the pan. Frequent stirring keeps heat even and the rice and onion from sticking.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, rice, pepper, vinegar):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Potatofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, rice, pepper, vinegar. 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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