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Devilled Kidneys

A dish of sheep kidneys coated in mustard, gherkins, mushroom ketchup, egg, bread crumbs, and fried in butter.

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 ↓

Devilled Kidneys

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mix mustard, gherkins, mushroom ketchup, and egg in a bowl.

  2. Dip each kidney in the mixture, then coat with bread crumbs.

Cook and serve

  1. Heat butter in a chafing dish until very hot.

  2. Cook the kidneys in the hot butter for 10 minutes.

  3. Serve immediately.

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. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Mushroom + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

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

  4. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Mustard + mushroomtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together881 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Sheep kidneys
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking to a tender interior with a browned crust.
Egg
Binds the seasoning mixture so it clings to the kidneys and then to the bread crumbs.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browned coating when fried in butter.
Butter
Fat that conducts heat for frying and adds richness and browning to the crust.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds savoury, umami depth to the coating mixture.

The step that matters

Heat the butter until very hot before adding the kidneys. Hot butter sears the coated surface quickly, creating a browned crust and sealing in juices. If the butter is not hot enough, the crumbs absorb fat and turn greasy and soggy.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, ketchup, egg, butter, bread):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, ketchup, egg, butter, bread. 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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