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A Sco Tch Haggis

A traditional Scottish dish made by stuffing a sheep's stomach with liver, heart, lungs, suet, onions, oatmeal, and broth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

A Sco Tch Haggis

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stomach

  1. Wash the sheep's stomach with cold water until clean, then turn it inside out and scald it.

  2. Scrape the stomach with a knife and soak it in cold salt water until ready.

Make the filling

  1. Parboil the liver, lungs, and heart.

  2. Grate the liver and mince the lungs and heart finely.

  3. Mince the suet and onions, then toast the oatmeal cakes and pound them into powder.

  4. Mix all the minced ingredients together, season with pepper and salt, and sprinkle the oatmeal powder over the mixture.

  5. Fill the stomach with the mixture, adding a cup of strong broth or gravy before sewing it up.

Boil

  1. Place the stuffed stomach in a pan with boiling water, ensuring it is covered, and place a small plate underneath.

  2. Prick the stomach with a needle to prevent bursting and boil for 4 to 5 hours, keeping it covered with boiling water.

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 + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  2. Liver + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,420 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Sheep's liver
Adds richness and moist body to the filling as it is grated finely.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the filling moist and tender during the long boil.
Oatmeal-cakes
Toasted and powdered, they absorb juices and give the filling its grainy, binding texture.
Onions
Add sweetness and savory aroma to the filling as they cook through.
Strong broth or gravy
Adds liquid that keeps the filling moist and well flavoured as it cooks.

The step that matters

Pricking the stomach before boiling. The stomach must be pricked with a needle so steam can escape during the long boil. Trapped steam and expanding filling can cause the casing to burst.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Mustardfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, 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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