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Stewed Steak and Macaroni

A slow‑cooked stew of beef and macaroni seasoned with pepper, salt, and ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stewed Steak and Macaroni

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and brown the beef

  1. Cut the beef into small pieces and dust with flour.

  2. In a skillet, heat butter and fry the beef lightly.

  3. Transfer the beef to a stewpan and cover with hot water.

Stew

  1. Simmer slowly for 1½ hours.

  2. Add the macaroni and simmer for an additional 45 minutes.

  3. Season with pepper, salt, and ketchup, then stew for 10 more minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve hot, with beef in the center and macaroni around.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + ketchuptop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 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

Lean beef
Provides the meat that becomes tender during long, slow simmering.
Flour
Coats the beef so it browns in the pan and helps thicken the cooking liquid.
Butter
Adds fat for frying, which carries flavor and promotes browning on the beef.
Macaroni
Starch that absorbs cooking liquid and adds body to the stew.
Ketchup
Adds sweetness and acidity, rounding out the savory stewed flavor.

The step that matters

Simmer the beef slowly for 1½ hours. Lean beef has connective tissue that breaks down gradually at a gentle simmer. Boiling it hard tightens the muscle fibers and leaves the meat tough and dry.

“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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