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Larded Sweetbreads

A dish of sweetbreads cooked in vinegar, then mixed with white sauce and mushrooms.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,525 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Larded Sweetbreads

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak sweetbreads in cold water immediately after purchase to prevent spoilage.

  2. Add 1 tablespoon of vinegar to the water for every 4 pounds of sweetbreads to help firm them up.

  3. Cook sweetbreads in the vinegar water until done.

  4. Break cooked sweetbreads into small pieces.

Cook and serve

  1. Mix sweetbreads with white sauce and finely chopped mushrooms.

  2. Cook the mixture for 10 minutes and serve.

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. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  2. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Vinegar + mushroomtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,070 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).

  4. Sauce + mushroomtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,480 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Vinegar + buttertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender and meaty when cooked through.
Vinegar
Added to the cooking water to help firm the sweetbreads.
White sauce
Binds the cooked sweetbreads together and adds moisture and creaminess.
Mushrooms
Add earthy flavor and a soft, moist texture to the mixture.

The step that matters

Cook sweetbreads in the vinegar water until done. Sweetbreads are delicate and can turn tough or rubbery if overcooked, while underdone ones stay unpleasantly soft. Acidic vinegar water helps the tissue hold its shape during cooking.

“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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