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Liver with Brown Sauce

A dish of sliced calf's liver cooked in bacon fat and served with a brown sauce made from Worcestershire sauce, mushroom catsup, and stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mushroom and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,580 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Liver with Brown Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liver

  1. Cut the liver into slices and cover with boiling water.

  2. Let it stand for 5 minutes to draw out the blood.

  3. Remove the liver and wipe it dry.

  4. Dredge with flour, salt, and pepper.

Fry the liver and bacon

  1. Fry the bacon until crispy.

  2. Add the liver to the hot bacon fat.

  3. Fry until browned on both sides.

  4. Place the liver on a hot dish with the bacon cut into small pieces.

Make the brown sauce

  1. Add the flour to the fat in the pan and stir until brown.

  2. Gradually add the boiling stock or water, stirring until it boils.

  3. Stir in the Worcestershire sauce, mushroom catsup, and salt to taste.

  4. Pour the sauce over the liver and serve.

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. Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Liver + mushroomtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together572 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Sauce + flourtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,078 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Mushroom + flourtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,253 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 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

Calf's liver
Provides the main meat; a brief soak in boiling water draws out blood for a milder flavour.
Bacon
Its fat fries the liver and its crisp pieces add savoury flavour.
Flour
Dredging coats the liver for browning, and cooked in the fat it thickens the sauce.
Stock or water
Liquid that loosens the browned flour into a smooth, pourable sauce.
Worcestershire sauce
Adds tangy, savoury depth to the brown sauce.
Mushroom catsup
Adds concentrated savoury, umami flavour to the brown sauce.

The step that matters

Stir the flour in the fat until brown. Cooking flour in fat until it browns builds a nutty flavour and colour in the sauce. Adding the liquid too early, or stopping the browning too soon, leaves the sauce pale and floury-tasting. Adding the stock gradually while stirring prevents lumps.

“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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