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Calves Ears Stuffed

Stuffed calf ears filled with liver, bacon, ham, bread, herbs, egg, and spices, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Calves Ears Stuffed

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the ears

  1. Scald and clean the calves' ears, cutting them close to the head.

  2. Boil the ears until tender, then blanch in cold water.

  3. Ensure the gristle next to the head is cut smooth for the ears to stand upright.

Stuff and bake

  1. Fill the cavity with a stuffing made from calf's liver, fat bacon, grated ham, soaked bread, herbs, egg, salt, and mace.

  2. Rub egg over the ears and stuffing, then dip in bread crumbs.

  3. Bake at 400°F (200°C) until golden brown.

  4. Serve with brown or white gravy, or tomato sauce.

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 + tomatotop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,013 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Liver + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together731 recipes

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

  5. Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Calves' ears
Form the main body of the dish, holding the stuffing as a shell.
Calf's liver
Adds richness and a firm, savoury body to the stuffing.
Fat bacon
Adds fat that keeps the stuffing moist and carries savoury flavour.
Bread
Soaked in cream or gravy, it adds moisture and binds the stuffing.
Egg
Binds the stuffing and, rubbed on the outside, helps the crumbs brown.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating through browning in the oven.

The step that matters

Cutting the gristle smooth. Gristle left rough at the base can stop the ears standing upright and can cause uneven cooking. Boiling until fully tender first ensures the ears are soft enough to stuff and bake without toughness.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, ham, bread, egg, tomato):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, ham, bread, egg, tomato. 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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