Name: Boiled Tongue
Ingredients: 1 tongue; flour; cloves; 1 cup jelly

Why it works: Flour and clove are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,671 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Boiled Tongue

Ingredients

1 tongue
flour
cloves
1 cup jelly

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.

Boil and season

Boil the tongue and skim off any impurities.
Sprinkle flour over the tongue.
Add cloves to the pot.

Glaze and bake

Pour 1 cup of jelly over the tongue.
Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for 15 minutes.

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.

Flour + clovetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,671 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Tongue: Provides the main meat, which becomes tender through boiling.
Flour: Thickens the cooking juices and helps the coating cling to the tongue.
Cloves: Adds a warm, aromatic spice flavour to the tongue.
Jelly: Melts over the tongue, adding sweetness and a glossy glaze.

“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.