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Liver Sauce

A sauce made from finely chopped livers, herbs, and spices, simmered with wine and stock, thickened with butter and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Tarragon and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 602 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Liver Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Chop the livers very small with parsley, scallions, tarragon leaves, and shallots.

  2. Soak the mixture in a little butter over low heat.

  3. Pound the mixture.

Simmer and strain

  1. Add cullis stock, pepper, and coarse sea salt.

  2. Bring to a boil with two glasses of red wine, coriander, cinnamon, and sugar.

  3. Reduce the sauce and strain it.

Finish and serve

  1. Thicken with a bit of butter rolled in flour.

  2. Serve in a sauceboat.

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. Tarragon + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together602 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Parsley + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Parsley + coriandertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Livers of poultry or game
Provide the main body and rich, savory flavor of the sauce.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and with flour it thickens the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the sauce when rolled into butter and stirred in.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth, and reduces to concentrate flavor.
Shallots
Contribute a mild aromatic sweetness that builds the sauce's base flavor.
Cullis stock
Supplies liquid and savory body for the sauce.

The step that matters

Reduce the sauce and strain it. Reducing concentrates flavor and thickens the liquid by evaporation, while straining removes the fine liver and herb solids so the sauce turns smooth. Simmering too hard or too long can make it overly thick or bitter.

Swap the coriander

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, parsley, tarragon, shallot, butter, pepper, red wine):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Corianderthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, parsley, tarragon, shallot, butter, pepper, red wine. 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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