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Boiled Brains

A dish of boiled brains seasoned with pepper, salt, and herbs, served with butter sauce and toasted bread.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,609 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Boiled Brains

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the brains in lukewarm water for 2 hours to draw out the blood.

  2. Tie the brains in muslin and place them in boiling water; boil for 20 minutes.

  3. Remove the brains, drain in a colander, and transfer to a basin.

Season and serve

  1. Beat the brains thoroughly with a fork, then season with plenty of black pepper, coarse sea salt, and a little marjoram or sage.

  2. Serve on a hot dish, pour over melted butter sauce, and garnish with snippets of toasted bread.

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. Pepper + marjoramtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,609 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Marjoram + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,008 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl decanoate (grape, waxy).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

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

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

Brains
Provide the rich, soft, delicate body that forms the main dish.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the sauce poured over the brains.
Toasted bread
Adds crisp, toasted contrast against the soft brains.

The step that matters

Soaking the brains. Soaking in lukewarm water draws out blood, which would otherwise darken the flesh and give a strong, off flavour. Brains are very delicate, so they should be handled gently and kept intact before boiling.

Swap the marjoram

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, bread, butter, sauce):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Marjoramthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, bread, butter, sauce. 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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