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Gravy for Haricots, Curries, or Hashes of Mutton

A savory gravy made from mutton kidneys, butter, onion, herbs, and water, seasoned with salt and pepper.

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 ↓

Gravy for Haricots, Curries, or Hashes of Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gravy

  1. Melt the butter in a pot.

  2. Add the chopped onion and mutton kidneys.

  3. Sauté until browned.

  4. Pour in the water and bring to a gentle boil.

  5. Simmer for 1.5 hours, or until thick and rich.

Finish the gravy

  1. Strain the gravy through a fine sieve.

  2. Remove the fat.

  3. Season with salt, cayenne, or black pepper to taste.

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. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Mutton + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together5,442 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Mutton + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,781 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Mutton + oniontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,531 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mutton kidneys
Provide the main meaty flavour and body that the gravy is built around.
Butter
Carries the heat and adds richness while the kidneys and onion brown.
Onion
Adds sweetness and savoury depth as it cooks down into the gravy.
Water
Forms the liquid that extracts flavour and, with simmering, thickens the gravy.

The step that matters

Sauté until browned. Browning the kidneys and onion creates Maillard reactions that build deep, savoury flavour. Pale cooking produces a flat gravy, so the surfaces need real colour before any liquid goes in.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, butter, 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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