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To Broil Beef Steaks

Broiled beef steaks seasoned with pepper, optionally served with mushroom catsup or butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Beef and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,232 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

To Broil Beef Steaks

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Select steaks from the middle of a well-kept, finely grained, tender cut of beef.

  2. Trim the steaks.

  3. Divide the steaks if very large.

  4. Preheat the gridiron until hot.

  5. Wipe the gridiron with fresh mutton suet.

  6. Lightly pepper the steaks.

  7. Place the steaks on the gridiron.

Broil and serve

  1. Cook the steaks for 8 to 10 minutes, turning once.

  2. Catch any juices that drain from the steaks in the serving dish.

  3. Serve immediately on hot plates.

  4. If desired, warm a small amount of mushroom catsup in the serving dish.

  5. Optionally, place a thin slice of fresh butter under the steaks 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 + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  2. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

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

  4. Beef + muttontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,373 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef steaks
Provide the main meat, whose fine grain and tenderness shape the eating texture.
Fresh mutton suet
Greases the hot gridiron so the steaks do not stick and gain light surface browning.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and fat to the finished steaks as an optional finishing touch.

The step that matters

Preheating the gridiron until hot. A very hot cooking surface sears the outside quickly, browning the steak and sealing in juices. A cool grid lets the meat stick and steam instead of browning.

“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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