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Jellied Beef

A dish of boiled beef and bones simmered until the broth gels, then mixed with minced meat and set in molds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 507 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Jellied Beef

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the beef

  1. Place the beef in a pot and cover with cold water.

  2. Boil slowly until the meat falls from the bones.

  3. Remove the beef.

  4. Drain the fat.

  5. Let the beef cool.

Make the broth

  1. Boil the bones and gristle for an additional 5 hours, adding more water as needed to keep covered.

  2. Strain the broth.

  3. Refrigerate the broth overnight.

  4. Remove the fat from the top of the broth.

  5. Boil the broth again if it hasn't jellied.

Set and serve

  1. Mince the meat.

  2. Mix the minced meat with the jellied broth.

  3. Add salt, pepper, sage, and marjoram to taste.

  4. Pour the mixture into molds or deep dishes.

  5. Refrigerate until set.

  6. Serve cold.

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. Sage + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Beef + marjoramtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together912 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Shin or knuckle of beef
Provides the meat and gristle that release gelatin into the broth as it simmers.
Beef bones and gristle
Release collagen during long simmering, which dissolves into gelatin and lets the broth set.

The step that matters

Boil the bones and gristle for 5 hours. Collagen from bones and gristle converts to gelatin only through long, steady simmering. Too short a boil leaves the broth thin and unable to set, so the dish will not jelly.

Swap the sage

The recipe marks sage as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper, marjoram):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Rosemaryfits about as well
  3. Sagethe original
  4. Parsleyfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper, marjoram. 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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