Why it works: Horseradish and potato work together. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 171 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Fillets of Beef
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fillets
Take slices of the middle of the fillet, keeping the fat about 1 inch thick, and season with salt and pepper.
Melt some butter on a plate and dip the fillet slices in it to prevent gravy from dropping out while broiling.
Broil and serve
Heat a gridiron over a clear fire, rub it with suet, and broil the fillets, turning them every minute for 8 to 10 minutes until browned.
Place the cooked fillets on a very hot dish, garnish with olives and scraped horseradish shaped like a rose, and serve with hot beef gravy poured around the dish.
Make the potatoes
To make potato ribbons, peel raw potatoes and cut long thin slices resembling ribbons, about 2 inches wide and 5 inches long.
Fry the potato ribbons in boiling fat until brown and crisp, and cut chips from the remaining potatoes and fry them the same way.
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.
-
Horseradish + potatotop 6% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together171 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
-
Olive + potatotop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,458 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
-
Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,052 recipes
Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).
-
Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,305 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
-
Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,971 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
- Beef fillet
- Provides the tender, juicy meat that is the centrepiece of the dish.
- Fresh butter
- Adds richness and moisture, coating the fillets so their gravy stays in while broiling.
- Suet
- Rubbed on the hot gridiron to add fat and keep the meat from sticking.
- Pure beef gravy
- Adds savoury moisture and meaty flavour served alongside the broiled fillets.
- Raw potatoes
- Fry to a brown, crisp finish as ribbons and chips, adding contrasting texture.
The step that matters
Broiling the fillets. Over a clear, very hot fire the outside browns quickly while the inside stays juicy. Turning them every minute spreads the heat evenly and prevents the surface from burning before the centre is cooked.
Swap the horseradish
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, butter, olive, potato):
- Tomatofits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Onionfits better
- Horseradishthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, butter, olive, potato. 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.
You might also like
Potato Croquettes255 recipes
Roast Beef211 recipes
Beef Loaf175 recipes
Corned Beef87 recipesThe free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.