Name: Liver Sausage with Onions
Ingredients: 28 pounds liver, cut into slices; 20 pounds cooked soft lard (preferably gut lard); 12 pounds bacon, cut into fine dice and slightly boiled; 40 pounds lean meat (soft-boiled beef lungs, well scalded calf's lungs or hearts, boiled meat of calf's head, neck, or breast); 10 to 12 onions; 53 ounces fine salt; 5.3 ounces white ground pepper; 1.5 ounces ground marjoram; 1 ounce mace, rubbed fine

Why it works: Pepper and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,609 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Liver Sausage with Onions

Ingredients

28 pounds liver, cut into slices
20 pounds cooked soft lard (preferably gut lard)
12 pounds bacon, cut into fine dice and slightly boiled
40 pounds lean meat (soft-boiled beef lungs, well scalded calf's lungs or hearts, boiled meat of calf's head, neck, or breast)
10 to 12 onions
53 ounces fine salt
5.3 ounces white ground pepper
1.5 ounces ground marjoram
1 ounce mace, rubbed fine

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 210°F (99°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Wash and scald the liver slices with hot water.
Chop the liver and onions finely.
Boil the gut lard and cut it into bean-sized pieces.
Slowly roast the onions in the gut lard in an enameled dish until light yellow, stirring constantly.

Mix and fill

Add the roasted onions to the chopped liver and mix well.
Spice the mixture with salt, pepper, marjoram, and mace, then knead until combined.
Fill beef middle guts or hog casings with the mixture.

Boil and cool

Boil the sausages at 210°F (99°C) for 25 to 30 minutes.
Cool the sausages in cold water, renewing the water constantly until perfectly cool.

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.

Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,609 recipes

Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together68,474 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Marjoram + macetop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together767 recipes

Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
Onion + marjoramtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,056 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Liver + oniontop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,420 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Liver: Forms the main body of the sausage, giving it its rich, dense texture and flavor.
Gut lard: Adds fat that keeps the sausage moist and smooth after cooking.
Bacon: Contributes extra fat and savory flavor, with diced pieces adding texture throughout.
Lean meat: Adds bulk and a firmer, more structured texture to the filling.
Onions: Add sweetness and aroma when slowly roasted until light yellow.

The step that matters

Slowly roasting the onions. Onions scorch easily over heat. Constant stirring and gentle cooking soften them and draw out sweetness without browning them bitterly, which would spoil the mild flavor of the filling.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, meat, onion, pepper, marjoram):

Thymefits better
Sagefits better
Parsleyfits better
Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, meat, onion, 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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Liver Sausage with Onions