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Lamb Sweetbreads Au Gratin

A baked lamb sweetbread gratin with bacon, stock, Madeira wine, truffles, mushrooms, and cockscombs, served over mashed potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Lamb Sweetbreads Au Gratin

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare and braise

  1. Prepare the lamb sweetbreads by removing any membranes and soaking them in cold water.

  2. In a suitable sauté pan, place chopped carrot and a little celery.

  3. Add the sweetbreads and pour in ½ pint of stock.

  4. Cover the sweetbreads with thin slices of fat bacon.

  5. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for about an hour, until golden brown.

Glaze and finish

  1. Glaze the sweetbreads with the best glaze, allowing it to run from the brush without touching the sweetbreads.

  2. Return to the oven for a few minutes without bacon.

  3. Glaze a second time.

  4. Bake again for a few minutes.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Prepare a sauce by boiling together brown sauce, 2 glasses of Madeira wine, truffle liquor, and mushroom juice until thickened.

  2. Serve on a border of mashed potatoes or quenelle.

  3. Garnish with a ragout of sliced truffles, mushrooms, and cockscombs.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + potatotop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,107 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  3. Truffle + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,900 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  4. Celery + potatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,047 recipes

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

  5. Lamb + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together520 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Lamb sweetbreads
Provide the tender, delicate meat that forms the body of the gratin.
Fat bacon slices
Baste the sweetbreads with melting fat and add savoury flavour as they bake.
Madeira wine
Adds sweetness and depth to the reduced sauce.
Mushrooms
Contribute earthy flavour to the garnish and mushroom juice in the sauce.
Truffles
Add a concentrated, aromatic earthy flavour to the garnish and sauce.

The step that matters

Glazing without touching the sweetbreads. Glaze must run from the brush onto the surface without touching the sweetbreads, because brushing directly can smear or tear the delicate surface and disturb the even browning that a glaze builds when baked in layers.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lamb, carrot, potato, truffle, mushroom, madeira wine):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Marjoramfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lamb, carrot, potato, truffle, mushroom, madeira wine. 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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