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Broiled Kidneys

Kidneys are boiled, opened, seasoned, broiled, and served with maitre d’hote sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Broiled Kidneys

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Plunge the kidneys in boiling water.

  2. Open them down the center without separating.

  3. Peel and pass a skewer across to keep them open.

  4. Season with salt and pepper, then dip in melted butter.

Broil and serve

  1. Broil over a clear fire, starting with the cut side.

  2. Remove the skewer and place a small piece of maitre d'hotel sauce in each kidney before serving.

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. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

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

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Kidneys
The main ingredient, which broils to a browned exterior with a tender interior.
Melted butter
Adds fat and richness, helping the surface brown and stay moist under the heat.
Maitre d'hotel sauce
Melts over the hot kidneys, adding rich fat and bright, herbal lemon flavor at the end.

The step that matters

Broil starting with the cut side. Searing the open cut side first sets the surface and browns it quickly, so the kidney holds its shape and cooks evenly without drying out.

“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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