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Round Steak

A thick round steak is browned, then braised in a flour‑based gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Round Steak

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Score the steak lightly on both sides.

  2. Flour the steak well.

Brown and braise

  1. Fry the steak in a moderate amount of bacon fat and butter until browned on both sides.

  2. Pour in enough hot water to just cover the steak.

  3. Cover tightly and cook gently for 20 to 30 minutes.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Remove the steak to a hot platter.

  2. Add more flour to the gravy, thin with cold milk or water, and bring to a boil.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Round steak
Is the tough cut that becomes tender during slow, moist cooking.
Flour
Coats the steak for browning and thickens the gravy as it cooks.
Bacon fat and butter
Fry the surface to brown it, adding color and savory flavor.
Hot water
Creates moist heat in the covered pan to braise the steak.
Milk or water
Thins the flour gravy to a pourable consistency.

The step that matters

Cover tightly and cook gently for 20 to 30 minutes. Gentle, covered simmering keeps the pan moist and lets connective tissue in the tough round steak soften. Boiling hard toughens the meat and can dry out the liquid too quickly.

“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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