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Curried Sweetereads

A dish of sweetbreads simmered in curried gravy, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 42,912 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Curried Sweetereads

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sweetbreads

  1. Wash and soak the sweetbreads as usual.

  2. Boil water with salt and the whole onion, then add the sweetbreads and simmer for 10 minutes. Alternatively, use weak veal broth instead of water.

  3. Remove the sweetbreads and let them cool completely on a drainer.

  4. Cut the sweetbreads into half-inch slices.

Make the curry

  1. Optionally, flour and fry the slices lightly in butter.

  2. Otherwise, place the slices in enough curried gravy to cover them.

  3. Stew gently for 20 to 30 minutes.

  4. Add lemon juice or chili vinegar to taste.

  5. Serve the curry very hot.

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 + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  3. Veal + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Onion + vealtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,841 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Onion + lemontop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,646 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Sweetbreads
Their tender, delicate texture is the main body of the dish.
Curried gravy
Carries the flavor and keeps the sweetbreads moist during the gentle stew.
Butter
Optional frying fat that browns the floured slices for a golden crust.
Lemon juice or chili vinegar
Adds acidity at the end to brighten and balance the rich curry.

The step that matters

Simmer the sweetbreads gently. Boiling toughens the delicate protein of sweetbreads, so a gentle simmer keeps them tender and creamy rather than firm and rubbery.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, veal, butter):

  1. Coconutfits about as well
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Avocadofits about as well
  4. Grapefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, veal, 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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