Why it works: Beef and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 25% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,677 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Suet Paste
Ingredients
Directions
Rub the chopped suet and flour together with the salt.
Add just enough water to form a stiff paste.
Work the mixture well and roll it out at least twice.
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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Beef + flourtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,677 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Beef and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 10,677 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
- Beef suet
- Provides fat that keeps the paste tender and rich as it cooks.
- Flour
- Forms the structure of the paste once mixed with water and worked.
The step that matters
Work the mixture well and roll it out at least twice. Working and rolling develops the gluten in the flour, giving the paste strength and elasticity so it holds together. Under-working leaves a crumbly paste that tears easily.
“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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