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To Broil Beef Steak

A steak broiled over live coals, served with butter, pepper, coarse sea salt, and optional coffee‑infused gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Broil Beef Steak

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare a good bed of live coals and heat a gridiron covered with a pan.

Broil

  1. Broil the steak for three minutes on one side without squeezing out the juice.

  2. Quickly turn the steak to the opposite side over the fire.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Season the juice collected on the platter with butter, pepper, and coarse sea salt, and keep warm over hot water.

  2. If needed, add a little liquid coffee to the gravy 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 + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  2. Beef + coffeetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together213 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methyl-3-(methyldithio)furan (thiamin, meat).

  3. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Butter + coffeetop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef steak
Is the main cooked protein; its juices collect on the platter to form the gravy.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the collected juices, giving the gravy a rounder, smoother taste.

The step that matters

Broil the steak without squeezing out the juice. Piercing or pressing the steak lets juices escape, leaving it drier and removing the liquid needed for the gravy. Turning quickly keeps heat from escaping from the surface.

“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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