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Stewed Kidneys

A savory dish of boiled kidneys simmered in a butter and flour gravy with Worcestershire sauce, mushroom ketchup, and sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Sauce and ketchup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,099 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Stewed Kidneys

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the kidneys

  1. Split and trim the kidneys, then cut them into small pieces.

  2. Cover the kidneys with cold water in a saucepan and bring to almost boiling.

  3. Drain the kidneys and repeat the cold water rinse twice more.

Make the gravy

  1. In a pan, brown ½ cup butter.

  2. Rub in 1 tablespoon flour.

  3. Add 1 cup stock or boiling water, Worcestershire sauce, mushroom ketchup, salt, and pepper.

  4. Add the chopped kidneys.

  5. Stir until heated through.

  6. Remove from heat and add a splash of sherry before serving.

Optional variation

  1. Alternatively, fry the chopped kidneys in butter with a little onion.

  2. Add the same ingredients to the gravy.

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. Sauce + ketchuptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,099 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Mushroom + sherrytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,176 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).

  3. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Mushroom + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Kidneys
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender when simmered in the gravy.
Butter
Carries flavour and browns, adding richness to the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the butter and stock into a smooth gravy.
Stock
Forms the liquid base of the gravy.
Worcestershire sauce
Adds savoury, tangy depth to the gravy.

The step that matters

Rinsing the kidneys in cold water. Repeated cold-water rinsing and brief heating draw out blood and strong-smelling compounds, reducing bitterness and off-flavours in the finished dish.

Swap the onion

The recipe marks onion as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, sauce, mushroom, ketchup, pepper, sherry):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, sauce, mushroom, ketchup, pepper, sherry. 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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