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Creamed Sweetbreads

A dish of sweetbread cubes sautéed with butter and flour, simmered in chicken stock and milk, seasoned with salt and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,172 recipes. Both carry 1-butyl acetate, which smells fruity, banana. The science ↓

Creamed Sweetbreads

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sweetbread

  1. Parboil the sweetbread.

  2. Cool the sweetbread.

  3. Cut the sweetbread into ½ inch cubes.

  4. Sprinkle the cubes with coarse sea salt.

  5. Dredge the cubes lightly with flour.

  6. Sauté the cubes in butter for five minutes.

  7. Drain the cubes.

Make the cream sauce

  1. Melt 2 tablespoons of butter.

  2. Add 3 tablespoons of flour to the melted butter.

  3. Gradually pour in ½ cup of chicken stock while stirring constantly.

  4. Gradually pour in ½ cup of milk or cream while stirring constantly.

  5. Season the mixture with salt and cayenne pepper.

Add mushrooms and serve

  1. Add ⅓ pound of cleaned mushroom caps.

  2. Break the mushroom caps into pieces.

  3. Sauté the mushroom pieces in butter.

  4. Serve in pastry cases.

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. Chicken + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Milk + mushroomtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,231 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

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

What each ingredient does

Sweetbread
Provides the tender, delicate meat that forms the body of the dish.
Flour
Dredges the cubes and thickens the butter mixture into a smooth sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and browns the cubes and mushrooms for flavour.
Milk or cream
Adds fat and body, giving the sauce a smooth, rich texture.
Chicken stock
Adds savoury depth and liquid that the flour thickens into the sauce.
Mushroom caps
Adds earthy flavour and a meaty texture to the dish.

The step that matters

Adding the stock and milk gradually. Pouring the liquid slowly while stirring constantly keeps the flour and butter mixed evenly, so the sauce thickens smoothly without lumps.

“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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