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Liver Cutlets

Liver cutlets made with ham or bacon, bread crumbs, herbs, mushrooms, and brown gravy, fried until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Ham and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,536 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

Liver Cutlets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Fry the ham or bacon in a little butter.

  2. Cut the liver into thick slices and mince it finely.

  3. Combine the minced liver, ham or bacon, bread crumbs, dried herbs, pepper, salt, chopped mushroom, and brown gravy in a bowl.

  4. Shape the mixture into small cutlets.

Fry and serve

  1. Brush the cutlets with egg and coat with bread crumbs.

  2. Fry the cutlets in boiling fat until golden brown.

  3. Drain the cutlets and place a tiny piece of macaroni at one end of each to imitate a bone.

  4. Serve very hot.

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. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  2. Bread + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Ham + mushroomtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,486 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's liver
Provides the main body and rich flavor of the cutlet.
Bread crumbs
Bind the mixture and form a crisp, golden coating when fried.
Brown gravy
Adds moisture and savory flavor to the filling.
Lean ham or bacon
Adds salty, savory flavor and fat to the filling.
Egg
Helps the bread crumb coating adhere and brown during frying.

The step that matters

Fry the cutlets in boiling fat until golden brown. The fat must be hot enough to brown the crumb coating quickly; if it is too cool, the cutlets absorb excess fat and turn greasy before the liver inside is cooked through.

“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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