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Beefsteak Smothered in Onions

Beefsteak smothered in onions is a savory dish of steak cooked with onions and salt pork.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,214 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beefsteak Smothered in Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the onions

  1. Fry the salt pork in a skillet until crisp.

  2. Remove the salt pork and keep it hot.

  3. Slice the onions.

  4. Add the sliced onions to the hot fat.

  5. Cover the skillet.

  6. Fry gently until the onions are tender, about 1 hour.

  7. Remove the onions from the skillet.

Cook the steak

  1. Place the beef in the skillet.

  2. Cover the beef with the onions.

  3. Sprinkle a little salt over the onions if needed.

  4. Cover the skillet.

  5. Cook quickly without scorching.

Serve

  1. Carefully transfer the dish to a hot platter.

  2. Add small bits of butter and a sprinkling of salt.

  3. Serve immediately.

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. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

  2. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

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

  3. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Sirloin or tender round steak
Forms the main body of the dish and is cooked briefly so it stays tender.
Onions
Soften into a sweet, moist layer that covers and flavours the beef as it cooks.
Salt pork
Renders fat for frying the onions and adds savoury, smoky richness.

The step that matters

Cook quickly without scorching. The beef needs a short, fairly high-heat cook to stay tender, but sugars in the onions and fat can scorch and turn bitter if the heat is too high or the pan is left unattended.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, butter):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Onionthe original
  3. Asparagusfits less well
  4. Capsicumfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, butter. 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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