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Sauce

Ciilfis or Brown Sauce

A hearty brown sauce made with veal, ham, butter, mushrooms, onions, herbs, carrot, lemon rind, spices, and brown gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,021 recipes mention both. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Ciilfis or Brown Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. In a stewpan, combine veal, ham, butter, mushrooms, onions, sweet herbs, carrot, lemon rind, allspice, cloves, and mace.

  2. Let it brown slightly at the bottom.

  3. Add the brown gravy and boil for 3 to 4 hours.

Finish the sauce

  1. Strain the mixture, color it with brown thickening, and boil for 10 minutes while stirring.

  2. Pass it through a tammy to finish the brown cullis.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Carrot + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together1,021 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Lemon + allspicetop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together2,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together12,525 recipes

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

  5. Carrot + lemontop 9% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,351 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Breaks down during long simmering to give the sauce body and rich meaty flavor.
Ham
Adds salty, savory depth that builds the sauce's overall flavor.
Butter
Carries flavor and helps the vegetables and meats brown at the start.
Onions
Caramelize during browning, adding sweetness and deep color to the sauce.
Brown gravy
Forms the liquid base that the other ingredients simmer into.

The step that matters

Letting the mixture brown slightly at the bottom. Browning the meat, vegetables and butter creates Maillard and caramelized flavors that give the sauce its color and depth. Stop before the bottom burns, since scorched bits make the sauce bitter.

Flavor stand-ins for the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, butter, mushroom, onion, carrot, allspice):

  1. Lemonthe original
  2. Coconutabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, butter, mushroom, onion, carrot, allspice. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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