Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓
To Dress Mutton Rumps and Kidney
Ingredients
Directions
Stew the rumps
Stew the mutton rumps in good mutton gravy for 30 minutes, then remove and let cool.
Strain the gravy to remove fat, then add boiled rice, onion with cloves, and mace; boil until the rice thickens.
Coat and fry
Wash the rumps with beaten egg yolks, then coat them with bread crumbs, pepper, coarse sea salt, parsley, thyme, and lemon peel.
Fry the rumps in butter until golden brown.
Lard the kidneys and roast them in a Dutch oven.
Drain the grease from the fried rumps before serving.
Serve
Warm the rice in the pan after clearing it of fat.
Serve the rice on a dish, arrange the rumps around it with narrow ends towards the center, and place the kidneys in between.
Garnish with hard boiled eggs and pickles.
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.
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Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together17,451 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).
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Clove + macetop 6% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together8,400 recipes
Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).
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Rice + oniontop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together10,433 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
-
Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together68,474 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Rice + peppertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,379 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Mutton rumps
- Main meat that is stewed, coated and fried to be the centrepiece of the dish.
- Egg yolks
- Beaten yolks act as a binding wash so the bread crumb coating sticks to the rumps.
- Bread crumbs
- Form a crisp, browned crust when the coated rumps are fried in butter.
- Butter
- Fat for frying that carries heat and browns the coated rumps to a golden colour.
- Boiled rice
- Thickens the strained gravy as it boils, giving the sauce body.
The step that matters
Drain the grease from the fried rumps. Frying in butter leaves surface fat on the crumb coating; draining it before serving keeps the crust crisp and the dish from tasting greasy.
Swap the mace
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, rice, onion, clove, egg, bread, pepper):
- Turmericfits better
- Nutmegfits better
- Parsleyfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, rice, onion, clove, egg, bread, 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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