Name: Pate-chaud of Leverets, with Truffles, a LA Perigueux
Ingredients: 2 leverets, cut into small joints; 3 ounces clarified butter; Salt and pepper to taste; 4 ounces truffles, cut into thick slices; 1 small piece of glaze; Perigueux sauce (to taste)

Why it works: Butter and truffle are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,209 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Pate-chaud of Leverets, with Truffles, a LA Perigueux

Ingredients

2 leverets, cut into small joints
3 ounces clarified butter
Salt and pepper to taste
4 ounces truffles, cut into thick slices
1 small piece of glaze
Perigueux sauce (to taste)

Directions

Prepare the leverets

Remove the hind legs and shoulders from the leverets.
Cut the loins into 2-inch pieces.
Trim the head into halves.

Brown and cook

Place all pieces in a sauté pan with clarified butter.
Season with salt and pepper.
Fry over high heat until browned.
Add the truffles and glaze.
Cover with a lid containing live embers.
Simmer on low heat for 20 minutes.
Stir in the Perigueux sauce.
Boil together for 3 minutes.

Serve

Garnish the pâté-chaud.
Serve.

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.

Butter + truffletop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,209 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together15,338 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Truffle + saucetop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,490 recipes
Pepper + truffletop 26% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,106 recipes

Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Leverets: Provide the tender meat that forms the body of the dish.
Clarified butter: Conducts heat for frying and adds rich fat that promotes browning.
Truffles: Add a strong earthy aroma that flavours the sauce and meat.

The step that matters

Fry over high heat until browned. Searing the meat at high heat drives the browning reactions that build deep flavour. Pieces that are crowded or wet will steam rather than brown, so they should be dry and spread out in the pan.

“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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Pate-chaud of Leverets, with Truffles, a LA Perigueux