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Veal Pot-pie

A stew of veal simmered in water with a crust of flour, butter, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Veal Pot-pie

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the veal

  1. Place the veal in a pot with 1 quart of water for every 5 pounds of meat.

  2. Heat over a slow fire.

  3. Just before boiling, skim the surface and add 1 teacup of cold water.

  4. Turn the meat to allow all scum to rise, then remove the scum.

Make the crust

  1. For the crust, mix 3 pints of flour with 2 ounces of butter and a little salt.

  2. Add enough milk to make a soft dough, knead well, and let it rise until light.

  3. Knead again and let it stand for 1 hour in winter or 30 minutes in summer.

  4. In summer, add ½ teaspoon of baking soda or use water and add another bit of butter.

Cook and serve

  1. Boil hard and season with salt and pepper, remembering the crust will absorb some seasoning.

  2. Cut the crust into equal pieces without rolling or molding them, and lay them on top of the meat to cover it.

  3. Cover the pot tightly and let it boil slowly for 1 hour.

  4. Wrap a cloth around the lid if it doesn't fit tightly to prevent steam from escaping.

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 + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

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

Flour and butter 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

Veal
Provides the meat and rich broth that the crust is cooked over and flavoured by.
All-purpose flour
Forms the dough structure that holds the crust pieces together while they cook.
Butter
Adds fat to the dough, giving the crust tenderness and richness.
Milk
Moistens the flour into a soft dough that can be kneaded and rise.
Baking soda
Helps the summer crust rise and lighten as it reacts in the dough.

The step that matters

Covering the pot tightly while the crust cooks. Steam trapped under a tight lid cooks the crust pieces through and keeps the broth from reducing. If steam escapes, the liquid evaporates and the crust can dry out or cook unevenly.

“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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