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Tripe and Onions

Tripe and onions is a stew of tripe and onions simmered with milk and water, thickened with flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Tripe and Onions

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the tripe

  1. Cut the tripe into 3-inch squares.

  2. Place the tripe in a stewpan and cover with cold water.

  3. Bring to a boil, then strain the water.

Simmer

  1. Return the tripe to the stewpan, add milk, water, and salt, and bring to a boil.

  2. Add the thinly sliced onions and simmer for about 3 hours.

  3. About 20 minutes before serving, mix the flour with a little milk until smooth.

  4. Pour the flour mixture into the stewpan, stir until boiling, and simmer for 15 minutes.

  5. Season to taste and serve.

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. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Onion + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together32,460 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Onion + milktop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Tripe
Forms the main body of the dish and becomes tender through long, gentle simmering.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma as they soften and release their flavour into the liquid.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess to the liquid, mellowing the dish.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth sauce when stirred and brought to a boil.

The step that matters

Mixing the flour with milk before adding it. Flour added directly to hot liquid clumps. Mixing it smooth with a little cold milk first lets the starch disperse evenly, so it thickens the sauce without lumps.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Arrowrootfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, 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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