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Fowl’s-Liver Stuffing for Birds

A liver-based stuffing for birds made with fowl livers, shallots, ham, herbs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Shallot and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,476 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Fowl’s-Liver Stuffing for Birds

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the fowl’s livers into small pieces.

Cook and pound

  1. In a frying pan, combine the livers, shallots, ham, thyme, nutmeg, pepper, salt, and butter.

  2. Cook over medium heat until partly cooked, then remove from heat and let cool.

  3. Pound the mixture in a mortar until smooth.

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. Shallot + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Thyme + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,907 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Shallot + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Fowl’s livers
Provide the main body and rich flavour of the stuffing.
Fat ham
Adds fat and savoury flavour to the mixture.
Shallots
Add a mild aromatic sweetness that softens as they cook.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the mixture cook smoothly in the pan.

The step that matters

Cook until partly cooked, then cool. Cooking only until partly done keeps the livers tender and prevents them from turning grainy or dry. Cooling before pounding lets the mixture firm up so it blends into a smooth paste rather than a runny one.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, shallot, ham, thyme, pepper, butter):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, shallot, ham, thyme, pepper, 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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