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Kidney Gravy, for Hashed Mutton, Haricots, and Curries

A gravy made from mutton kidneys, butter, onion, herbs, and water, simmered until thick.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Kidney Gravy, for Hashed Mutton, Haricots, and Curries

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Strip the skin and fat from the kidneys and slice them.

  2. Flour the slices.

Make the gravy

  1. Melt the butter in a deep saucepan and add the kidneys and chopped onion.

  2. Add the fine herbs and cook over medium heat until most moisture evaporates.

  3. Pour in the boiling water, add salt and pepper, and let it boil gently for 1.5 hours or until thick.

  4. Strain through a fine sieve and remove the fat.

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

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

  2. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Mutton + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Mutton + oniontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,531 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton kidneys
Provide the meat that gives the gravy its body and rich flavour.
Butter
Carries flavour and enriches the gravy as it cooks with the kidneys.
Flour (in the method)
Coats the kidney slices and helps thicken the gravy as it simmers.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savoury depth as it softens in the butter.

The step that matters

Simmering until thick. Boiling gently rather than vigorously keeps the kidneys tender and lets the flour and liquid thicken slowly into a smooth gravy. Too hard a boil can toughen the meat and break up the texture.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, butter, 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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