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Mock-Turtle a Second Way

A stew of calf head pieces in veal gravy, Madeira wine, cayenne, truffles, morels, and lemon, thickened with flour and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Artichoke and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 466 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Mock-Turtle a Second Way

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Dress the hair off the calf's head and boil it for half an hour.

  2. Cut the boiled head into pieces half an inch thick and one and a half inches long.

Stew and finish

  1. Place the pieces into a stew pan with veal gravy and salt to taste.

  2. Let it stew for one hour.

  3. Add the Madeira wine, cayenne pepper, truffles, and morels.

  4. When the meat looks clear and the gravy is strong, add half a lemon.

  5. Thicken the gravy with flour and butter.

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. Artichoke + flourtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together466 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Pepper + artichoketop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,170 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Veal + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together815 recipes

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

  4. Truffle + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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

Calf's head
Provides the gelatinous meat and skin that give the soup its body and richness.
Veal gravy
Forms the savoury liquid base that the head pieces simmer in.
Madeira wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavour to the stewed gravy.
Flour and butter
Thicken the gravy, giving it a smooth, body-rich texture.

The step that matters

Thicken the gravy with flour and butter. Flour must be cooked in fat to form a roux before liquid is added, or it stays lumpy and tastes raw. Adding it gradually and simmering gently gives a smooth, evenly thickened gravy.

“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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