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Stewed Sweetbreads

A stew of sweetbreads simmered with parsley, cream, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Stewed Sweetbreads

Ingredients

Directions

Stew the sweetbreads

  1. Parboil the sweetbreads as directed.

  2. Place the sweetbreads in a small amount of water to stew.

  3. When tender, add 2 teaspoons of chopped parsley and ¼ cup of cream.

Finish and serve

  1. Season with salt and pepper.

  2. Let them simmer for five minutes.

  3. Serve in a covered dish with the gravy.

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

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

  2. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  3. Parsley + creamtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,392 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Sweetbreads
Main protein that softens into a tender texture during slow stewing.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the gravy, making it smoother and more velvety.
Parsley
Contributes fresh, green aroma that lightens the rich gravy.

The step that matters

Simmer gently after adding the cream. Cream can separate or curdle when it boils hard, so keeping the liquid at a gentle simmer helps the gravy stay smooth.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, pepper):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Celeryfits better
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, pepper. 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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