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Pork Cutlets, Grilled

Grilled pork cutlets served with a buttery gravy and gherkins.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Pork Cutlets, Grilled

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cutlets

  1. Trim off nearly all the fat from the cutlets.

  2. Shape the cutlets uniformly.

  3. Season both sides with salt and pepper.

  4. Dip the cutlets in warm butter.

  5. Coat the cutlets with breadcrumbs.

Grill and make the sauce

  1. Grill the cutlets over a clear fire for 20 minutes, turning 3 or 4 times.

  2. Melt the remaining butter in a small saucepan.

  3. Add the flour to the melted butter.

  4. Stir the mixture over the heat for 2 to 3 minutes.

  5. Add the gravy and vinegar to the saucepan.

  6. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  7. Season the sauce to taste.

  8. Stir in the gherkins.

Serve

  1. Arrange the cutlets in a circle on a hot dish.

  2. Pour the sauce around the cutlets.

  3. Serve.

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 + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

Butter and flour 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

Pork cutlets
Provide the lean meat that is grilled and served as the main dish.
Butter
Coats the cutlets for moisture and helps the breadcrumbs brown; also enriches the sauce.
Flour
Cooked with butter to form a roux that thickens the sauce.
Gravy or stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, adding savoury flavour.
Gherkins
Add a tangy, acidic crunch to the sauce.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the sauce and balances its richness.

The step that matters

Stir the roux over the heat. Cooking flour in melted butter for 2 to 3 minutes cooks out its raw starch taste and lets it thicken the liquid smoothly when the gravy is added. Stopping too early leaves a pasty flavour and a weaker sauce.

“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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