Name: Calf's Liver and Bacon
Ingredients: 1 calf's liver, sliced ¼ inch thick; hot water; 1 pound bacon; pepper, to taste; coarse sea salt, to taste; flour, for dredging; 2 ounces butter; 1 tablespoon flour; 1 cup water

Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Calf's Liver and Bacon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Soak the liver in hot water for a few minutes to remove blood, then dry it with a cloth.
Cut the bacon into thin slices, equal in number to the liver slices.

Cook the liver and bacon

Fry the bacon slices until crisp.
Keep the bacon warm.
Season the liver with pepper and salt, dredge in flour, and fry in the bacon fat until nicely browned.
Serve each slice of liver topped with a slice of bacon.

Make the gravy

Pour off most fat from the pan.
Add butter and flour to the pan, and mix well.
Add water, salt, and pepper, then boil the gravy.
Serve the gravy in a gravy boat.

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.

Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together50,459 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Liver + buttertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,065 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
Liver + peppertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,375 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's liver: Is the main meat, browned on the outside while staying tender inside after a quick fry.
Bacon: Adds salty, smoky fat for frying the liver and a crisp topping for each slice.
Flour: Dredging coats the liver so it browns well, and flour thickens the gravy.
Butter: Adds richness and flavour to the gravy and helps form its base with the flour.

The step that matters

Fry the liver until nicely browned. Liver is delicate and overcooking makes it dry and grainy. Dredging in flour helps create a browned crust, so cook it quickly over steady heat and stop once browned.

“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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Calf's Liver and Bacon