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Rump-steak Pie

A baked pie made with rump steak, shallots, pepper, salt, mushroom ketchup, and gravy or red wine.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Mushroom and shallot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,982 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Rump-steak Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the steak

  1. Cut the Rump-Steak into pieces the size of your hand, trimming off skin and sinews.

  2. Beat the pieces with a chopper.

  3. Chop the shallots finely and mix with pepper and salt.

Layer and bake

  1. Strew some of the mixture at the bottom of a dish.

  2. Layer the steak pieces, alternating with the seasoning mixture, until the dish is full.

  3. Add the Mushroom Ketchup and gravy or red wine.

  4. Cover the dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for two hours.

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. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

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

  2. Mushroom + red winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together720 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pepper + shallottop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

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

  5. Red wine + shallottop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together231 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Rump-steak
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender during the long, covered baking.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds deep savoury flavour and salt-like depth to the meat and sauce.
Gravy or red wine
Supplies liquid that keeps the meat moist and forms the sauce as it cooks.
Shallots
Add mild sweetness and aromatic flavour that mellows during baking.

The step that matters

Cover the dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for two hours. Covering traps steam so the liquid keeps the meat moist, while slow, long heat breaks down the tough connective tissue in rump steak so it becomes tender rather than dry or chewy.

Swap the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, mushroom, ketchup, red wine):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Shallotthe original
  4. Carrotfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, mushroom, ketchup, red wine. 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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