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Beef-liver Stew

A stew of sliced beef liver simmered with lemon, spices, and pork drippings, thickened with cornstarch.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Beef-liver Stew

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liver

  1. Cut the liver into slices and wash them well in lukewarm salted water.

  2. Dry the liver on a napkin.

Stew and finish

  1. Heat pork drippings in a frying pan and fry the liver for about 3 minutes.

  2. Transfer the liver to a small stew pan, add enough water to cover, the lemon slices, spices, and salt and pepper.

  3. Cover the pan and stew slowly for 30 minutes.

  4. Stir a little cornstarch mixed with water into the gravy.

  5. Taste and adjust seasoning if necessary.

  6. Serve on a small platter.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cinnamon + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  5. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Beef liver
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender during slow stewing.
Cornstarch
Thickens the cooking liquid into a gravy as it is stirred in.
Pork drippings
Adds fat and savory flavor when used to fry the liver.
Lemon
Adds acidity and brightness to the stewing liquid.

The step that matters

Stewing the liver slowly. Liver turns tough and grainy when overcooked or boiled hard. Gentle, covered simmering keeps the slices tender and moist while the gravy develops.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, liver, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, pepper, pork):

  1. Limefits about as well
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Applefits about as well
  4. Orangefits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, liver, cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, pepper, pork. 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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