Name: Fillets Mignon of Beef with Bearnaise Sauce
Ingredients: Fillets of beef; Bearnaise sauce ingredients (butter, egg yolks, vinegar, shallots, tarragon)

Why it works: Shallot and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 492 recipes mention both. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Fillets Mignon of Beef with Bearnaise Sauce

Ingredients

Fillets of beef
Bearnaise sauce ingredients (butter, egg yolks, vinegar, shallots, tarragon)

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).
Season the fillets of beef with salt and pepper.
Sear the fillets in a hot skillet until browned on both sides.
Transfer the fillets to the oven and cook to your desired doneness.
In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg yolks, vinegar, and shallots.
Slowly add melted butter while whisking to create the Bearnaise sauce.
Stir in chopped tarragon and season with salt to taste.
Serve the fillets topped with Bearnaise 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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

Shallot + tarragontop 2% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together492 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Vinegar + tarragontop 4% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together1,299 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Vinegar + shallottop 6% of all pairs

Aroma overlaplow

Mentioned together2,282 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Beef + tarragontop 7% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together217 recipes

Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).
Sauce + shallottop 7% of all pairs

Aroma overlaplow

Mentioned together1,292 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

Flavor stand-ins for the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, sauce, butter, egg, vinegar, tarragon):

Shallotthe original
Asparagusabout as good a flavor fit
Mustardabout as good a flavor fit
Tomatoabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, sauce, butter, egg, vinegar, tarragon. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).