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Calf’s Liver

A calf liver baked with salt pork, seasoned with sea salt, and basted with water, butter, and pan gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Liver and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,606 recipes. Both carry 1-nonanal, which smells fatty, waxy. The science ↓

Calf’s Liver

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.

Prepare

  1. Soak the liver in salt water for 1 hour to draw out the blood.

  2. Make incisions across the liver and insert thin slices of salt pork.

Bake and baste

  1. Bake the liver at 400°F (200°C) for 1 hour.

  2. Baste twice with water and butter.

  3. Then baste with the gravy from the pan.

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. Liver + porktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,606 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-nonanal (fatty, waxy).

  2. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  3. Liver + buttertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's liver
Is the main dish, cooked whole until tender and browned on the outside.
Salt pork
Adds savoury fat and salt that melts into the liver as it bakes.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the basting liquid, aiding browning on the surface.

The step that matters

Basting with water and butter, then pan gravy. Basting keeps the surface moist and encourages even browning during the long bake. Liquid on the surface helps prevent the liver from drying out and toughening.

“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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