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Liver a LA Bordelaise

Liver slices coated in breadcrumbs, broiled, and served with Bordelaise sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Liver a LA Bordelaise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the liver

  1. Parboil the liver slices, then trim and pare them nicely.

  2. Season with salt and pepper, then baste with melted butter.

  3. Roll the liver in fresh bread crumbs.

Cook and serve

  1. Broil over moderate heat until thoroughly cooked.

  2. Dish in a circle, alternating with fried brown bread slices.

  3. Pour Bordelaise sauce in the center.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Liver + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together731 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Liver + buttertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,065 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Liver
Forms the main protein; parboiling and then broiling cook it through while keeping it tender.
Fresh bread crumbs
Form a crisp coating that browns under the broiler and protects the surface of the liver.
Melted butter
Adds fat that carries seasoning and helps the crumb coating brown.
Bordelaise sauce
Adds the main savoury, wine-based flavour and moisture to the dish.

The step that matters

Broil over moderate heat until thoroughly cooked. Liver turns dry and grainy when overcooked, while undercooked liver is unsafe to eat. Moderate heat lets the interior cook through before the bread crumb coating burns.

“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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