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Roasted Pig’s Liver

Roasted pig's liver seasoned with fennel, garlic, herbs, and breadcrumbs, wrapped in caul and skewered with bay leaves.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Fennel and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,216 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Roasted Pig’s Liver

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the liver into moderate-sized pieces.

  2. In a bowl, combine the liver with fennel seeds, garlic, herbs, salt, pepper, and oil.

  3. Let the liver marinate for several hours.

Wrap and roast

  1. Roll each piece in grated breadcrumbs.

  2. Wrap each piece in pig's caul and skewer with a bay leaf in between.

  3. Roast the skewers over a brisk fire until cooked.

Serve

  1. Serve on a hot dish garnished with fried parsley and a side of rich gravy.

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. Fennel + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,216 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Fennel + garlictop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together969 recipes

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

  3. Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

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

  4. Liver + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Liver + garlictop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together269 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Pig's liver
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking to a tender, firm texture.
Pig's caul
Wraps each piece, basting it as it roasts and keeping it moist.
Grated breadcrumbs
Coat the pieces, adding a crisp, browned crust during roasting.
Oil
Carries the seasonings and helps the outside brown in the heat.
Fennel seeds
Add a sweet, aromatic anise-like flavour that suits rich liver.

The step that matters

Roast until cooked over a brisk fire. Liver turns dry and grainy if overcooked, while underdone liver is unsafe to eat. A brisk fire browns the outside quickly, so the inside should be checked for doneness rather than left by time alone.

Swap the fennel

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Fennelthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, garlic, 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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