Why it works: Beef and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,032 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓
Beef Liver for Gravy
Ingredients
Directions
Hang the liver to drain.
Salt it well and leave it for twenty-four hours.
Hang it up to drain again until it stops dripping.
Soak it in water, then remove and dry it.
Sew it up and roast it, basting frequently.
Serve with a little gravy made from the drippings.
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.
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Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,032 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
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Liver + breadtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together731 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Beef + livertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together431 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
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