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Stewed Calf's Liver

A dish of diced calf liver stewed in butter, onion, stock, and seasonings, finished with sherry and optional mushrooms.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Stewed Calf's Liver

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the diced liver in cold water for 10 minutes.

  2. Heat the butter in a saucepan.

  3. Fry the sliced onion until golden. Remove the onion from the pan.

  4. Dry the liver pieces with cloths.

  5. Season the liver pieces with salt and pepper.

  6. Dredge the liver pieces in flour.

Cook the liver

  1. Fry the liver in the butter until light brown.

  2. Add the stock, cover, and simmer for 30 minutes.

  3. Remove the liver and keep warm on a platter.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Thicken the gravy with browned flour.

  2. Season the gravy with salt, parsley, ketchup, and lemon juice.

  3. Bring the gravy to a boil.

  4. Add sherry to the gravy.

  5. Pour the gravy over the liver.

  6. Add champignons if desired.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,633 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Tomato + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,592 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

Calf's liver
Forms the main body of the dish, becoming tender when gently simmered in liquid.
Flour
Coats the liver for browning and thickens the gravy as it cooks.
Butter
Fat for frying the liver and adds richness and browning flavour.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savoury aroma to the butter and gravy.
Stock
Provides the liquid that simmers the liver into a savoury gravy.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich gravy and balances the liver.

The step that matters

Fry the liver until light brown, then simmer. Browning the floured liver builds flavour on the surface, while overcooking in the simmer makes liver tough and grainy. Keep the simmer gentle and covered so the liver stays tender.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, butter, onion, pepper, flour, tomato, ketchup):

  1. Lemonthe original
  2. Limefits about as well
  3. Avocadofits about as well
  4. Grapefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, butter, onion, pepper, flour, tomato, ketchup. 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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