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Fillet of Beef Braised

A braised beef fillet cooked with ham, gravy, carrots, celery, onions, pickled chili, gherkin, herbs, salt, mace, and allspice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Fillet of Beef Braised

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Roll the inside sirloin of beef together to bring the fat into the center.

  2. Strew the bottom of a stewpan with ham slices and add gravy to prevent burning.

  3. Place the rolled meat on top of the ham and cover with chopped carrots, celery, button onions, pickled chili, gherkin, sweet herbs, salt, mace, and allspice.

Braise

  1. Simmer until the meat is tender.

Finish and serve

  1. Brown the meat before a fire or with a salamander.

  2. Skim and season the sauce.

  3. Serve the meat, sauce, and vegetables together in the same dish.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,021 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Celery + allspicetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,422 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Inside sirloin of beef
Forms the main body of the dish; slow simmering turns its connective tissue tender.
Ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour to the base and helps season the braising liquid.
Gravy
Provides the liquid that braises the meat and forms the sauce.
Carrots
Contribute natural sweetness and body to the sauce as they soften.
Celery
Adds aromatic flavour to the braising liquid as it cooks down.
Button onions
Add sweetness and savoury depth to the sauce as they cook.

The step that matters

Simmer until the meat is tender. Gentle, low simmering breaks down the connective tissue slowly. Rapid boiling toughens the muscle fibres and can leave the meat dry and stringy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, ham, carrot, celery, onion, allspice):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, ham, carrot, celery, onion, allspice. 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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