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Calf’s Liver and Bacon

A dish of sliced calf liver fried with bacon, served with optional mashed potatoes and a simple gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 19% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 50,459 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Calf’s Liver and Bacon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liver

  1. Cut the liver into slices about 1 inch thick.

  2. Wash the slices in warm water to remove blood.

  3. Dry the liver with a cloth.

  4. Mix the flour, salt, and pepper on a plate.

  5. Dip each piece of liver in the mixture.

Cook

  1. Heat a frying pan and fry the bacon until cooked.

  2. Keep the bacon warm on a dish.

  3. Cook the liver over high heat for 1 minute.

  4. Lower the heat and cook gently for 4 minutes.

  5. Turn the liver over and sear for 1 minute on high heat.

  6. Lower the heat to finish cooking gently.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Add 1 tablespoon of flour to the pan fat and cook until brown.

  2. Gradually add ½ cup of hot water or stock.

  3. Arrange the liver and bacon in a circle on a plate.

  4. Place mashed potatoes in the center if desired.

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. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Liver + flourtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Liver
Provides the main body of the dish and a rich, meaty texture when seared and cooked gently.
Streaky bacon
Adds salty, savoury fat that flavours the pan and crisps alongside the liver.
Flour
Coats the liver so it browns during frying and thickens the pan fat into gravy.

The step that matters

Cooking the liver over high heat, then gently. Liver turns dry and grainy if overcooked. A quick high-heat sear browns the surface, and gentle finishing heat cooks the centre without toughening it.

“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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