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Breslau of Meat

A baked meat custard made with beef, veal, or chicken, butter, breadcrumbs, cream, parsley, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,232 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Breslau of Meat

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Beat the egg yolks and finely chop the parsley.

  2. Mix all the ingredients well together.

Bake

  1. Brush custard cups with melted butter and press the mixture into them.

  2. Partly fill a baking pan with boiling water and place the cups in it.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. When done, turn them out onto a heated dish.

  2. Pour tomato sauce around and garnish with triangles or hearts of toasted bread.

  3. Serve hot.

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. Beef + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  5. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Chopped beef, veal, or chicken
Provides the main body and protein structure that holds the custard together.
Egg yolks
Set when heated, binding the mixture and giving it a firm, custard-like texture.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the custard tender rather than dry.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps release the custard from the cups.
Fresh bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and add body, helping the mixture hold its shape.

The step that matters

Partly fill the baking pan with boiling water. The water bath surrounds the cups with gentle, even heat, so the egg sets smoothly without curdling or overcooking at the edges.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, butter, bread, cream, egg, sauce, mushroom):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Tarragonfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, butter, bread, cream, egg, sauce, mushroom. 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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