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Scrapple

Scrapple is a pork loaf made from liver, head meat, scraps, cornmeal, and buckwheat flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Marjoram and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 507 recipes. Both carry 2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Scrapple

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the meat

  1. Cook the liver, head meat, and scraps until bones drop out easily.

  2. Remove from heat.

  3. Chop finely.

  4. Season with salt, pepper, marjoram, and sage.

  5. Strain the cooking liquid.

Make the mush

  1. Return the liquid to the stove.

  2. Add equal parts cornmeal and buckwheat flour to the liquid, stirring until it forms a thick mush.

  3. Cook until the meal is well done.

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. Marjoram + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Buckwheat + flourtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together660 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Marjoram + buckwheattop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Cornmeal
Thickens the cooking liquid into a mush that sets once cooled.
Buckwheat flour
Adds body and thickening starch alongside the cornmeal, helping the mush hold together.
Hog liver
Contributes rich, savory flavor and depth to the meat mixture.

The step that matters

Cook the cornmeal and buckwheat mush until well done. Stirring the meal into hot liquid gelatinizes its starch and thickens it. Cooking it fully keeps the mush from tasting raw and helps it set firmly when chilled.

Swap the buckwheat

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Rosemaryfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Buckwheatthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, meat, pepper, marjoram, sage, flour. 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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