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Stewed Kidneys

Stewed kidneys simmered in a rich sauce of onion, flour, cornflour, stock, tomato sauce, Harvey sauce, and browning, served over mashed potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stewed Kidneys

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the kidneys

  1. Place the kidneys in boiling water for a few minutes.

  2. Remove the skin, cut them in half, and take out the core.

  3. Wipe the kidneys, lightly flour them, and fry in hot dripping for six minutes.

  4. Set the kidneys aside while making the sauce.

Make the sauce

  1. Add enough clarified dripping to the frying pan to make 1.5 ounces.

  2. Fry 1 ounce of chopped onion in the dripping until light brown.

  3. Stir in 1 ounce of flour and 1 ounce of cornflour.

  4. Gradually pour in 1 pint of stock (or water), stirring continuously until smooth and thick.

  5. Season the sauce with salt, pepper, nutmeg, tomato sauce, Harvey sauce, and browning to achieve a rich brown color.

Stew and serve

  1. Strain the sauce into a stewpan, add the kidneys, and place the stewpan in boiling water.

  2. Cover and cook for 2 hours, replenishing the water as needed.

  3. Serve the kidneys inside a wall of mashed potatoes and pour the sauce over them.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Tomato + potatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

  5. Nutmeg + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Kidneys
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender during the long, gentle stew.
Flour
Thickens the sauce and lightly coats the kidneys for browning when fried.
Cornflour
Adds thickening power to the sauce, giving a smooth, glossy texture.
Onion
Adds savory sweetness and aroma as it browns in the dripping.
Tomato sauce
Adds acidity and savory depth to the sauce.
Browning
Deepens the color of the sauce to a rich brown.

The step that matters

Cook the sauce to smooth and thick before adding the kidneys. Flour and cornflour must be stirred into the fat and then the liquid gradually so starch swells evenly. Lumps stay if liquid is added too fast, and the sauce will not thicken properly.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, onion, pepper, tomato, sauce, potato):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Cuminfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, onion, pepper, tomato, sauce, potato. 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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