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Fried Kidneys

A dish of lamb kidneys fried in bacon fat, served with bacon, gravy, and toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Lamb and bread work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 598 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Fried Kidneys

Ingredients

Directions

Fry the kidneys

  1. Fry the bacon in a pan until done, then keep it warm.

  2. In the bacon fat, fry the halved kidneys slowly for 10 minutes, turning often.

  3. Remove the kidneys and keep them warm with the bacon.

  4. Stir Worcestershire sauce and catsup into the gravy left in the pan.

Serve

  1. Place the toasted bread on a platter.

  2. Lay the kidneys on top of the bread.

  3. Pour the gravy over the kidneys.

  4. Arrange the bacon around the edge of the platter.

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. Lamb + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together598 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Lamb + saucetop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together925 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).

  3. Sauce + breadtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,934 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lambs' kidneys
Provide the main meat, which browns on the outside while staying tender inside when fried slowly.
Bacon
Its fat is used to fry the kidneys, adding savory flavor and browning.
Worcestershire sauce
Adds savory, tangy depth to the pan gravy.
Catsup
Adds sweetness and acidity to the pan gravy.

The step that matters

Frying the kidneys slowly. High heat can toughen kidneys and leave the centre raw or the outside burnt. Gentle heat, with frequent turning, cooks them evenly and keeps them tender.

“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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