Why it works: Pepper and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 21% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 85,593 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Beefsteak, Fried
Ingredients
Directions
Fry the steak
Heat enough butter or fat in a frying pan to barely cover the bottom.
Add the steak and fry one side quickly.
Turn the steak and fry the other side until browned.
Cook the steak a little more slowly, turning it repeatedly to avoid burning the fat.
Serve
Serve with a little butter spread on top or with gravy.
To make gravy, drain off the fat, add boiling water to the sediment, season with salt and pepper, boil, skim, strain, and serve.
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.
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Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Rump steak
- Is the main protein, cooked by quick frying so the outside browns while the inside stays tender.
- Butter or frying fat
- Conducts heat to the steak and browns its surface, and forms the base for the pan sediment used in gravy.
The step that matters
Cook the steak a little more slowly, turning it repeatedly. Fat in the pan can burn and turn bitter once it overheats, so turning the steak often and lowering the heat keeps the fat from scorching while the meat finishes cooking.
“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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