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White Fricassee of Sweetbreads

A white fricassee of sweetbreads simmered in broth, finished with a cream‑egg sauce and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

White Fricassee of Sweetbreads

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash the sweetbreads well, then soak them in very cold, slightly salted water for 30 minutes.

  2. Blanch the sweetbreads by plunging them into boiling water for an instant, then place them in ice water for 5 minutes.

Stew

  1. Put the sweetbreads in a covered saucepan with the broth, seasoned with pepper, salt, and a touch of onion, then sprinkle with nutmeg and cover the saucepan.

  2. Stew the sweetbreads for 1 hour if whole, or 45 minutes if sliced.

Finish and serve

  1. Heat the cream in another saucepan until scalding hot but not boiling, then remove it from the heat.

  2. Slowly stir the hot cream into the beaten eggs.

  3. Add the egg mixture slowly to the sweetbreads while stirring continuously.

  4. Stir in the parsley and serve in a hot covered dish.

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 + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Sweetbreads
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender when gently stewed in liquid.
Eggs
Set and thicken the sauce, binding it into a creamy coating for the sweetbreads.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, silky texture to the finished sauce.
Veal or lamb broth
Provides moisture and a savory base that cooks the sweetbreads and forms the sauce.

The step that matters

Adding the egg mixture to the sweetbreads. Egg proteins set when heated, so if the hot mixture goes in too fast or unstirred it can curdle into lumps. Adding it slowly while stirring continuously keeps the sauce smooth and evenly thickened.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, cream, butter, nutmeg, veal, pepper):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Cinnamonfits about as well
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Sagefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, cream, butter, nutmeg, veal, pepper. 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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