the meat of domestic cattle, Bos taurus, eaten mainly in N. Europe, the Americas, and Australia. The word derives from Anglo-Norman bœuf; less desirable parts of the animal are referred to in English with the Saxon prefix ‘ox’ (oxtail, ox cheek, etc.), reflecting the social divide which existed in England after the Norman Conquest.
Beef usually comes from castrated males (steers, or bullocks), which are killed at about 18 months to 2 years, providing tender meat. Heifers not required for breeding are also used. Up to the age of 6 months, the meat of young cattle is regarded as veal. The consumption of veal in France and Italy, where it is most popular, runs at about a third that of beef. Cattle that are older than veal yet younger than adult beef are sometimes eaten in countries where the climate is too hot to permit hanging the meat without extensive refrigeration. In Normandy, where this type of meat is well liked, it is called bouvillon.
The quality of beef from a particular animal is partly dictated by its breed, a subject discussed under cattle. Fodder is also important. Grass-fed beef is considered to have the best flavour, although many cattle are intensively reared on grain. To rear cattle using grain, or pasturing them on land suitable for growing grain, is an inefficient use of food resources. Seventy per cent of grain grown in the USA goes to animal feed, yet only 60 per cent of a cow will go towards human nourishment. The world is eating more and more beef, particularly in the USA and countries influenced by its food habits. This is both cause and consequence of developments in beef husbandry. Of this, there are two major types: the extensive ranch allowing free range, herded when necessary by cowboys (first practised in Spain); and the intensive enclosed agriculture (of Britain and other northern countries) where the animals are maintained in fields, brought indoors during the winter, often fed on grain and concentrates. A hybrid system may also obtain. Increased consumption has seen both a growth in the grain-fed cattle lots of N. America, and an extension of prairie ranching into hitherto forested or marginal lands. Often the forests, for example in Brazil and Latin America, fall victim to wild grasses of African origin, changing the ecology of a region for ever. See meat, where many other matters relevant to beef are also discussed.
Medieval contributions to the art of beef cookery—beyond simple roasting and boiling—were the development of the pie, and braising. Beef olives originated during this time too. Broiled or grilled steaks were also popular. During the 16th century these were made into ‘carbonadoes’, see carbonade and carbonado.
As the thick pottages of medieval cookery went gradually out of fashion, they were partly replaced with ‘made dishes’ of meat in sauce: for example braises, ragouts, daubes, and hashes.
Beef was also treated by salting (this may be called ‘powdered’ beef in early English documents). Some was cured with spices and molasses, and simmered for immediate consumption; more was barrelled in brine or smoked for long keeping. Another way of dealing with beef was to souse and collar it. Cheaper cuts were used for potting; Scottish potted hough is made from shin of beef.
During the 19th century, beef acquired a position of primary importance in European haute cuisine. The coarser cuts went into the pot to provide a foundation for stock-enriched sauces, or to be cooked and boiled down for consommé. The offal was used up in economical dishes. (In England beef suet went into the crust for English suet puddings.) Even the bones were roasted and the bone marrow extracted to spread on toast. Whenever possible, a piece of beef was added to the composite boiled meat dishes of peasant and bourgeois cookery, such as the New England boiled dinner, French pot-au-feu, Italian bollito misto, Spanish cocido (cozido in Portugal), and Romanian ciorbă (see shorba), which provide broth or soup for a first course, and a plain meat course to follow.
One side effect of this, especially in Britain, was that large amounts of cold beef had to be ‘used up’ in other dishes. Mrs Beeton devoted much space to ‘cold meat cookery’ including baked beef, a precursor to shepherd's pie; a beef ragout; broiled beef and oyster sauce; and bubble and squeak. Rissoles, hashes, and curries were other uses for leftovers. Thus evolved the English habit of serving a large roast of beef on a Sunday, and making the remains into a series of dishes for the other days of the week.
The study of food science advanced during the 19th century with the discovery of proteins, then known as albumen, in fluid extracted from meat. It was erroneously thought that meat could be ‘sealed’, allowing a crust to form on the outside early in cooking, thus preserving these precious fluids. This belief is not entirely extinct; it belongs, however, to the realm of culinary mythology. McGee (1990) writes well and in detail on this, and on 19th-century preoccupations with meat extracts, which affected attitudes to beef and provoked much activity in Britain in making ‘beef tea’, and in the production of items such as Oxo.
The British have earned for themselves an enviable reputation for roasting beef:
The English men understand almost better than any other people the art of properly roasting a joint, which is also not to be wondered at; because the art of cooking as practised by most Englishmen does not extend much beyond roast beef and plum pudding.
Thus wrote the Swede Per Kalm in 1748. Like many other clichés, that of the rosbif, the beef-fed Englishman with a fleshy face and high colour, contains more than a grain of truth. For centuries visitors have commented upon the excellence and quantity of beef eaten in England. They also noted the English liking for rare beef, a taste which according to Rumohr (1822) led many continental visitors to believe that it was actually raw meat which was being eaten. With the disappearance of open fires from most kitchens, what is known as ‘roast’ meat today is actually oven baked; but the principle is still based on the use of dry heat. Yorkshire pudding, gravy, roast potatoes, boiled greens, and horseradish sauce are the usual accompaniments to roast beef.
British cooks perform adequately in other areas of beef cookery, offering such specialities as Boiled beef with carrots and various pastry-based items, including steak and kidney puddings or pies, and several items which belong to the pasty category: Cornish pasties and the Forfar bridie. A much grander pastry dish is Beef Wellington, an English equivalent to the French Bœuf en croûte.
French cookery is famous for slow-cooked rich stews, in which the beef may be left in one piece, or cut up. Bœuf à la bourguignonne, cooked with wine, salt pork, and garnished with mushrooms and small onions, is probably the best known. A rich beef stew is also characteristic of Flemish cooking, where it is known as carbonnade (see carbonade and carbonado), and contains onions and beer, and is topped with a crust of mustard-flavoured bread. Italians, too, make hearty meat stews; those from the north are more likely to contain beef, such as a Lombardy stufato, a stew of beef with tomato. Further south, the Stufato alla romana is based on shin of beef.
Braised beef is popular in C. and E. Europe. For German Sauerbraten (see Germany), a cut suitable for pot-roasting is marinated in a mixture of wine vinegar, water, and spices for two days or so, then cooked in the marinade, and served with potato dumplings.
A famous beef dish of Russian cookery is Beef Stroganov. It consists of strips of fillet steak browned swiftly in butter, served in a sauce of shallots, wine, and soured cream. There is some disagreement over which Stroganov, Alexander Grigorievich Stroganov, who lived in the Black Sea port of Odessa, and did much entertaining, or a 19th-century diplomat, one Count Paul Stroganov, is the person honoured. Another beef dish which has become internationally popular is the Hungarian goulash.
Cured beef remains important. See preservation; salting; drying; also corned beef; pastrami; Bündnerfleisch.
In those parts of the world where for various reasons there is no strong tradition of eating beef, there may be a slight tendency towards increased consumption caused by the general ‘internationalization’ of foods or, as in Japan, by the development of a new connoisseurship. In the area around Kobe, Japanese shimofuri (marbled beef) is raised on a diet including rice, rice bran, beans, beer, enhanced by regular massage. This is very fine and some distinctive methods for cooking it have evolved.
Alan Davidson was a distinguished author and publisher, and one of the world's best-known writers on fish and fish cookery. In 1975 he retired early from the diplomatic service—after serving in, among other places, Washington, Egypt, Tunisia, and Laos, where he was British Ambassador—to pursue a fruitful second career as a food historian and food writer extraordinaire. Among his popular books are Seafood of South-East Asia, North Atlantic Seafood, and Mediterranean Seafood. In 2003, shortly before his death, he was awarded the Erasmus Prize for his contribution to European culture.
McGee, Harold (1990), The Curious Cook, San Francisco: North Point Press.
Rumohr, Karl Freidrich von (1822), Geist der Kochkunst.
