Beef soup

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In the province, pressure cooker is not used to tenderize beef used for beef soup, what they do is put a metal fork inside the boiling beef and let it boil for some time and the beef becomes tender. Some grandmothers I knew, they put instead a match to soften the beef. Is there any scientific explanation regarding this? I just wonder, but the fork thing really helps in making the beef tender in a shorter time. I know nowadays, seldom oldies used this method anymore (pressure cooker has been introduced) but I still wonder why, does the metal element in fork helped in making the beef tender? Or how about phosphorus which is present in matches (actually what they did is to burn first the matches then put it in the boiling beef). So what’s with the burned phosphorus? Or the metal? Help me please to understand this old tradition!