Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Tripe and Onions
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the tripe
Cut the tripe into pieces about 3 inches by 2 inches.
Trim off the fat.
Wash the tripe in cold water.
Dry the tripe on a clean cloth.
Rub the tripe with lemon juice to whiten it.
Blanch the tripe in boiling water for 5-10 minutes.
Make the stew
Add the new milk and the tripe to a stewpan.
Simmer gently for 2-3 hours, stirring frequently.
Boil the onions until tender.
Chop the onions and add them to the tripe.
Season with salt, pepper, and pounded sugar.
Stir in flour to thicken the sauce 15 minutes before serving.
Fried version
For a fried version, dip boiled tripe in batter.
For a fried version, fry the tripe in butter with minced eschalots until golden brown.
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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Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together27,047 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together68,474 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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, becoming tender during long gentle simmering.
- New milk
- Creates the creamy, mild liquid that the tripe and onions cook in.
- Onions
- Add sweetness and body to the sauce as they soften and break down.
- Flour
- Thickens the milk into a smooth sauce that coats the tripe.
- Lemon juice
- Acidity that helps whiten the tripe before cooking.
The step that matters
Simmer gently for 2-3 hours. Tripe is a tough connective tissue that only becomes tender with long, gentle heat. Boiling hard can toughen the meat and curdle the milk, so keep it at a low simmer and stir often to prevent sticking.
Swap the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, milk, pepper, sugar, flour, butter):
- Arrowrootfits better
- Capsicumfits better
- Sweet potatofits better
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, milk, pepper, sugar, flour, 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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