Why it works: Pepper and summer savory work together. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 671 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓
Tongue with Spanish Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the tongue
Dissolve ½ cup of salt in boiling water to cover the tongue.
Cook the tongue until done. Remove the skin from the tongue and slice it thinly.
Make the pepper sauce
Cut the peppers open and remove seeds and veins.
Drop the pepper skins into boiling salted water (½ cup salt), press them under water, and keep at boiling heat for 2 hours without simmering.
Skim the pepper skins into a bowl and chop until you have a red pulp.
Press the pulp through a sieve.
Season the sauce with oil and vinegar. Add salt cautiously, as olives will add salt.
Assemble and serve
Dip each slice of tongue into the sauce and pile the slices in a deep dish.
Pour the remaining sauce over the tongue.
Serve the next day on a white platter, decorated with blanched celery stems.
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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Pepper + summer savorytop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together671 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,092 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
-
Summer savory + oniontop 7% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together299 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Olive + oniontop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together29,779 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together18,971 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
- Beef tongue
- Forms the main body of the dish, supplying the sliced meat that is served.
- Dry chili peppers
- Provide the red colour and pungent flavour of the sauce once the pulp is pressed.
- Olives
- Add briny, salty flavour to the dish, so the sauce needs less added salt.
- Vinegar
- Adds acidity that sharpens the sauce and balances the richness of the meat.
- Olive oil
- Adds fat and smoothness to the sauce, carrying flavour across the tongue slices.
The step that matters
Keep the pepper skins at a boil without simmering. Holding the skins at a steady rolling boil for the full two hours softens them thoroughly so they break down into a smooth pulp; a gentler simmer may leave the skins tough and the sauce coarse.
Swap the summer savory
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, olive, pepper, vinegar, onion):
- Garlicfits better
- Thymefits better
- Tarragonfits better
- Summer savorythe original
Fit is the average pairing score against beef, olive, pepper, vinegar, onion. 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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