Name: Beef Heart
Ingredients: 1 beef heart; veal stuffing; brown gravy; currant jelly; coarse sea salt; pepper

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Heart

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.

Cook the beef heart thoroughly and remove the skin.
Wipe the heart daily with a clean cloth.
Stuff the heart with veal stuffing.
Roast the heart at 400°F (200°C) for 2 hours and 15 minutes.
Make a brown gravy as you would for hare.
Serve the heart with the gravy and currant jelly.

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.

Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together18,971 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Beef + vealtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,784 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).
Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,049 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Beef + curranttop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,464 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Currant + peppertop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,345 recipes

Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).