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Fried Beef Liver

Fried beef liver is a dish of sliced liver coated in flour or breadcrumbs, beaten egg, and fried in butter and hot fat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Fried Beef Liver

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the beef liver into ¼ inch thick pieces.

  2. Pour boiling water over the liver to seal the pores.

  3. Roll the liver in flour or bread crumbs, and season with salt and pepper.

  4. Dip the liver in beaten egg.

Fry

  1. Fry the liver in hot fat mixed with ⅓ cup of butter.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Beef + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,847 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Beef liver
The main protein, which fries to a browned exterior with a tender interior when sliced thin.
Flour or bread crumbs
Forms a dry coating that browns during frying and helps the crust hold.
Egg
Binds the coating to the liver so it adheres during frying.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour to the frying fat and helps the surface brown.

The step that matters

Frying the liver. Liver overcooks quickly and turns dry and grainy when held too long in hot fat. Fry briefly over steady heat so the coating browns while the centre stays tender.

“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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