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Stewed Giblets

A stew of gizzard, liver, pinions, neck, and other ingredients simmered in broth with herbs, spices, and Sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Capsicum and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,571 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Stewed Giblets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean the gizzard and slice it along with the liver.

  2. Divide the pinions at the joints and cut the neck into six pieces.

  3. Scald and skin the feet.

Make the sauce

  1. Place all ingredients into the broth or stock.

  2. Add the mixed herbs, chopped onion, capsicums, cloves, ketchup or mushroom powder, artichoke bottoms, salt, and Cayenne pepper.

  3. Cook until the giblets are tender, then strain the sauce.

Finish

  1. Return the meat and sauce to the stewpan.

  2. Rub the butter into enough flour to form a paste.

  3. Add the flour paste, Sherry, and lemon juice to the giblets.

  4. Warm gently without boiling.

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. Capsicum + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,571 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Liver + vealtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together392 recipes

    Shared aroma: enoic acid (butter, cheesy).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Capsicum + clovetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,438 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Clove + artichoketop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together175 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Broth or stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce and carries the flavour of the dish.
Flour
Thickens the sauce into a smooth, body-rich consistency when mixed with butter.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the flour blend into a paste.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the rich sauce.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a sweet, mellow depth to the sauce.
Neck
Its connective tissue softens during stewing, giving the sauce body and meaty flavour.

The step that matters

Warm gently without boiling. Once the flour paste is stirred in, boiling can break the sauce and thin the starch's thickening power, while gentle heat keeps the sauce smooth and evenly thickened.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, veal, capsicum, clove, ketchup, artichoke, pepper):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Turnipfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, veal, capsicum, clove, ketchup, artichoke, pepper. 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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