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Baked Liver and Bacon

A dish of sliced liver cooked in bacon fat, served with a gravy and accompanied by crisp bacon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 50,459 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Baked Liver and Bacon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liver

  1. Cut the liver into ½ inch slices.

  2. Cover the slices with boiling water and let stand for 5 minutes to draw out the blood.

  3. Drain the water, remove the veins and skin.

  4. Wipe the liver.

  5. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Brown the bacon and liver

  1. Brown the bacon in a frying pan.

  2. Cook in hot bacon fat until browned on both sides, turning occasionally.

Make the gravy

  1. Heat 2 tablespoons of bacon fat in a pan.

  2. Add 4 tablespoons of flour. Brown them together.

  3. Gradually add 2 cups of boiling water, stirring until smooth.

  4. Season with salt and pepper.

  5. Add the browned liver slices to the gravy and cook slowly for 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve the liver and gravy on a hot dish, arranging the crisp bacon around the edge.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Liver + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,375 recipes

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

  3. Liver + flourtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,418 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

Liver
Provides the main meat, whose firm texture sets against the smooth gravy.
Flour
Thickens the bacon fat and water into a smooth gravy as it browns and cooks.
Bacon fat
Fat for browning the liver and making the roux, adding savory flavor.
Bacon
Adds smoky, salty flavor and crisp texture as a garnish for the dish.

The step that matters

Draw out the blood. Soaking the liver in boiling water for 5 minutes draws out blood, which otherwise makes liver taste bitter and strong. Skipping it, or overcooking the liver, leaves it tough and dry.

“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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