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Beef Tongue

A boiled beef tongue seasoned with salt, spices, and sugar, glazed, and served with herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Beef Tongue

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the tongue overnight if dried and smoked; if pickled, soak for a few hours.

  2. Trim the root of the tongue.

Cook

  1. Place the tongue in a pot of cold water and simmer over low heat for 1 to 2 hours before bringing to a boil.

  2. Keep the tongue simmering for 3 to 4 hours, checking for doneness by probing with a skewer.

Glaze and serve

  1. Glaze the tongue.

  2. Rub the skinned tongue with egg yolk.

  3. Sprinkle the tongue with bread crumbs and minced herbs.

  4. Baste the tongue with butter.

  5. Brown the tongue with a salamander.

  6. Garnish with a paper frill and flowers before serving.

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. Clove + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Mace + allspicetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,189 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef tongue
Forms the meat that is simmered until tender and then glazed.
Coarse sea salt
Seasons the tongue and draws out moisture during curing.
Saltpetre
Gives the cured meat its pink colour and characteristic cured flavour.
Brown sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the salt in the cure.
Egg yolk
Binds the bread crumbs to the surface and helps them brown.
Butter
Adds fat and richness and helps the glaze brown during basting.

The step that matters

Keep the tongue simmering for 3 to 4 hours, checking for doneness by probing with a skewer.. Collagen in the tongue breaks down slowly at a gentle simmer. A rolling boil toughens the muscle and can break the meat apart, so the tongue should stay at a steady, low simmer until a skewer slides in easily.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, sugar, pepper, clove, allspice, butter, egg):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, sugar, pepper, clove, allspice, butter, egg. 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.

More beef tongue recipes

Boiled 58Pickled 14Baked 13Braised 13Roasted 12Smoked 12 See all 42 →

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