Why it works: Egg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Fried Liver
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Prepare a dish of boiling water on the stove.
Simmer and coat
Drop in a few slices of liver at a time and let them simmer for a few minutes.
Lift out each slice and dip it in a bowl with the beaten egg.
Coat the liver in salted flour.
Fry
Fry the liver slowly in oil or fat with the lid on the pan until well done.
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.
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Liver + eggtop 28% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,177 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Liver + flourtop 28% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,418 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
- Liver
- Provides the main protein and rich flavour that the dish is built around.
- Egg
- Binds the flour coating to the liver so it adheres during frying.
- Flour
- Forms a coating that helps the outside brown and crisp while frying.
The step that matters
Fry slowly with the lid on. Frying gently with a lid keeps the slices from drying out while the centre cooks through, while the coating still browns. Cooking too hot may brown the outside before the inside is done.
“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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