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Haggis

A savory pudding made from liver, suet, onion, dried meal, beef scraps, and broth, boiled in a bag.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and beef are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Haggis

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Grate the liver and mince the suet and onion.

  2. Mix the liver, suet, onion, and dried meal together well.

  3. Season the mixture with coarse sea salt and mixed spices.

Make the broth

  1. Make beef broth using scraps of beef and water from boiling.

Bag and boil

  1. Put the haggis mixture into a bag and add the broth.

  2. Sew up the bag, removing all air before sealing.

  3. If the bag is thin, wrap it in a cloth.

  4. Boil the haggis for at least 2 hours.

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. Onion + beeftop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Liver + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,420 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Liver + beeftop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Liver
Adds richness and a dense, savoury body to the filling.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and tender as it cooks.
Dried meal
Absorbs liquid and gives the filling its firm, crumbly texture.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aroma to the filling.
Beef broth
Adds moisture so the filling cooks through softly rather than drying out.

The step that matters

Removing all air before sealing the bag. Trapped air can expand during boiling and burst the bag, and pockets of air can leave the filling unevenly cooked. Pressing out air before sealing keeps the haggis compact and intact.

“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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