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Boiled Beef Tongue

A boiled beef tongue served plain or with a simple vinegar-sugar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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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 ↓

Boiled Beef Tongue

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the tongue

  1. Wash the beef tongue and place it in a pot with enough water to cover it.

  2. Add ½ cup of coarse sea salt and a small pod of red pepper.

  3. Boil until the tongue can be pierced easily with a fork, adding more water as needed.

  4. Remove the tongue from the pot and let it cool; peel if serving immediately.

  5. If storing for later, do not peel until ready to serve.

Variations

  1. For salt tongue, soak overnight and cook the same way, omitting the salt.

  2. For an optional sauce, after peeling, place the tongue in a saucepan with 1 cup of water, ½ cup of vinegar, and 4 tablespoons of sugar.

  3. Cook until the liquid evaporates.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  2. Sauce + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,147 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  4. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Beef + saucetop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,650 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef tongue
Is the main cut that becomes tender through long simmering in water.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the meat and helps draw flavor into the cooking liquid.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity to the optional sauce, balancing the sugar.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to the optional sauce, balancing the vinegar's acidity.

The step that matters

Boiling until tender. Connective tissue in tongue breaks down slowly into gelatin during long, gentle simmering. Stopping too early leaves the meat tough, so test with a fork until it pierces easily.

“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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