Name: Liver with Brown Sauce
Ingredients: one pound calf's liver; two slices of bacon; one tablespoonful of mushroom catsup; one tablespoonful of flour; one-half pint boiling stock; one tablespoon- ful of worcestershire sauce; one side then; salt

Why it works: Liver and mushroom work together. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 572 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Liver with Brown Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liver

Cut the liver into slices.
Cover the slices with boiling water and let stand five minutes to draw the blood.
Take the slices out and wipe dry.
Dredge the slices with flour, salt, and pepper.

Cook the liver and bacon

Fry the bacon until cooked.
Place the liver slices in the hot bacon fat and fry brown on one side, then the other.
Place the liver and bacon on a hot dish, cut into small pieces.

Make the sauce and serve

Add flour to the fat in the pan, stir until brown.
Add the boiling stock or water, stir again until it boils.
Add the Worcestershire sauce, mushroom catsup, and salt to taste.
Pour the sauce over the liver and serve.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

522Calories

19 gProtein

5 gFat

98 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Flour	1 cup (125g) all-purpose	455
Bacon	1 slice cooked (8g)	43
Mushroom	1/2 cup sliced (35g)	15
Soy Sauce	1 tbsp (15ml)	9
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Liver	not in our table	0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Gibson, Marietta Fauntleroy Hollyday, "Mrs. C. H. Gibson.". 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. See the original page.

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.

Liver + mushroomtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together572 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Flour + saucetop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,078 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Mushroom + flourtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,253 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Mushroom + saucetop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,480 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Liver + saucetop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together499 recipes

Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's liver: Main protein that browns on the outside while staying tender inside when fried briefly.
Bacon: Supplies fat for frying the liver and adds savory, smoky flavor.
Flour: Browns in the pan fat and thickens the sauce as the liquid is added.
Boiling stock: Forms the liquid base of the sauce that carries the other flavors.
Worcestershire sauce: Adds tangy acidity and savory depth to the sauce.
Mushroom catsup: Adds concentrated savory, earthy flavor to the sauce.

The step that matters

Frying the liver. Liver turns dry, grainy and tough when overcooked, because its proteins tighten under prolonged heat. Fry each side only until browned and the slices are cooked through.

“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 with Brown Sauce