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The Scotch Haggis

A Scottish dish made from sheep's pluck, beef suet, onions, oatmeal, and spices, cooked and seasoned.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion 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 ↓

The Scotch Haggis

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pluck

  1. Clean the sheep's pluck thoroughly.

  2. Make incisions in the heart and liver to allow blood to flow out.

  3. Parboil the whole pluck for 30 minutes, changing the water after a few minutes.

  4. Remove half of the liver.

  5. Boil the removed half of the liver until it can be grated easily.

Mince and mix

  1. Take the heart, half of the liver, and part of the lights, trimming away any skins and dark parts.

  2. Mince the trimmed parts together.

  3. Mince the beef suet and four onions.

  4. Grate the other half of the liver.

  5. Peel and scald the small onions in two waters.

  6. Mix the peeled and scalded small onions with the minced meat.

  7. Toast the oatmeal until light brown and dry, using about 2 cups for this quantity of meat.

Combine and season

  1. Spread the mince on a board.

  2. Sprinkle the oatmeal over the mince.

  3. Season with pepper, coarse sea salt, and a little cayenne.

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 + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Oatmeal
Absorbs fat and juices and gives the haggis its crumbly, filling texture.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the mixture moist and rich as it cooks.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma to the mince as they soften.
Liver (in the method)
Adds deep, rich flavour and body to the mixture.

The step that matters

Parboil the whole pluck. Parboiling firms the meat and offal so they can be minced cleanly, and changing the water removes surface impurities and excess blood that would otherwise make the flavour harsh.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Tomatofits better
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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