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Beef Heart

A roasted beef heart stuffed with marjoram, baked with bacon and butter, served with currant jelly sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and red wine work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 575 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Beef Heart

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Soak the beef heart overnight in vinegar and water.

  2. Wash and clean the heart thoroughly, removing all the thick white skin.

  3. Stuff the heart with savory stuffing, using more marjoram than usual.

  4. For improved flavor, cover the heart with slices of fat bacon and roll it with the stuffing.

Make the gravy

  1. Make a strong beef gravy.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake the heart at 300°F (150°C) for 4 to 5 hours, basting frequently with butter or larding it.

  2. To serve, accompany with currant jelly sauce.

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. Vinegar + red winetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together575 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Beef + red winetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,017 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Vinegar + curranttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together693 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Sugar + saucetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Red wine + curranttop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together113 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef heart
Forms the main meat, which becomes tender with long, slow cooking.
Fat bacon
Adds fat that keeps the lean heart moist and adds savory flavor during roasting.
Butter
Basting fat that promotes browning and a rich, moist surface.
Beef gravy
Adds savory beef flavor and moisture to the roast and its sauce.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavor to the sauce.
Currant jelly
Adds sweetness and tartness that balances the rich meat.

The step that matters

Long, slow baking with frequent basting. Heart is a dense, lean muscle that needs low, steady heat over hours to become tender. Frequent basting keeps the surface moist and encourages even browning, so the meat does not dry out before it softens.

Swap the marjoram

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, vinegar, butter, red wine, sugar, currant, sauce):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Marjoramthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, vinegar, butter, red wine, sugar, currant, sauce. 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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