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Heart Sweetbreads

Heart sweetbreads braised with bacon, stock, and butter, served over stewed peas.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and peas are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,460 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Heart Sweetbreads

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Place green onions in the center of a baking dish.

  3. Cover the green onions with thin layers of fat bacon.

  4. Moisten the dish with 1 pint of good stock.

  5. Cover with a round of buttered paper.

  6. Cover the dish with a lid.

Braise

  1. Bring the sweetbreads to a boil on the stove.

  2. Transfer the dish to the oven.

  3. Braise for about 20 minutes, basting frequently with the liquid.

  4. Remove the lid and paper.

Glaze and serve

  1. Return the dish to the oven to dry the surface.

  2. Glaze the sweetbreads.

  3. Serve on a bed of stewed peas.

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 + peastop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,460 recipes

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

  2. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Butter + peastop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Sweetbreads
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender and moist when braised.
Stock
Provides moisture and savoury flavour for braising in the covered dish.
Fat bacon
Melts over the onions, adding fat and flavour that baste the sweetbreads.
Green onions
Form an aromatic base that flavours the braising liquid and fat.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the paper-covered surface brown gently.

The step that matters

Drying the surface before glazing. Surface moisture keeps a glaze from sticking and browning evenly. Returning the uncovered dish to the oven dries the surface so the glaze can set and colour well.

Swap the peas

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

  1. Sesamefits better
  2. Peanutfits better
  3. Almondfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, butter. 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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