Name: Stuffed Beef Heart
Ingredients: ½ pint bread crumbs; 2 teaspoons chopped suet; 1 heaped teaspoon salt; 1 heaped teaspoon pepper; 1 tablespoon milk; 1 beaten egg

Why it works: Bread and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Stuffed Beef Heart

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stuffing

Open the large end of the beef heart enough to insert the stuffing.
In a bowl, combine bread crumbs, chopped suet, salt, pepper, milk, and beaten egg.

Stuff and roast

Stuff the mixture into the heart.
Roast the stuffed heart until tender.
If the heart seems tough, parboil it first.
Stuff and roast.

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.

Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,662 recipes

Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together88,785 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together26,984 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Bread crumbs: Form the bulk of the stuffing and soak up moisture from the milk and egg.
Chopped suet: Adds fat that keeps the stuffing moist and rich during roasting.
Beaten egg: Binds the crumbs and suet so the stuffing holds together in the heart.
Milk: Moistens the bread crumbs so the stuffing is soft rather than dry.

“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.