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Veal Kidneys

A sautéed veal kidney dish with ghee, flour, wine, broth, mushrooms, and lime.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lime match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,491 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Veal Kidneys

Ingredients

Directions

Cook

  1. Heat ghee or butter in a stewpan until it begins to brown.

  2. Add the sliced kidneys and stir until browned.

  3. Sprinkle in the flour and stir well.

  4. Pour in the white wine and broth, then add mushrooms.

  5. Boil for 5 minutes, seasoning with pepper, salt, nutmeg, and lime juice.

  6. If the mixture is too thick, add a little more broth.

Serve

  1. Serve plain or in a croustade of lightly browned bread.

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. Pepper + limetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,491 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. White wine + mushroomtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,765 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  3. Nutmeg + limetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together236 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 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

Veal kidneys
Form the main body of the dish, becoming tender when browned and cooked briefly.
Flour
Thickens the pan juices into a sauce that clings to the kidneys.
White wine
Adds acidity and depth, and helps lift browned bits from the pan into the sauce.
Broth
Provides liquid for the sauce and moisture that loosens it if it thickens too much.
Mushrooms
Add earthy savoury flavour and moisture to the sauce.

The step that matters

Browning the kidneys. Kidneys cooked too long or at too low a heat turn firm and rubbery and can release a strong taste. Browning them quickly over good heat seals the surface and keeps the inside tender.

Swap the lime

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ghee, flour, white wine, mushroom, pepper, nutmeg):

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Limethe original
  3. Mangofits less well
  4. Coconutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ghee, flour, white wine, mushroom, pepper, nutmeg. 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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