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Calf, S Head Hash

A hash made from boiled calf's head, gravy, anchovy, spices, and garnished with brain cakes, mushrooms, and egg yolks.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 23 ingredients
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Why it works: Anchovy and ketchup match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 479 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Calf, S Head Hash

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the head

  1. Clean the calf's head thoroughly and boil it for 15 minutes.

  2. Cut the meat into thin slices and place in a pan with gravy.

  3. Stew for 45 minutes.

Season and thicken

  1. Add anchovy, mace, Cayenne, lemon pickle, walnut ketchup, truffles, lemon slices, herbs, and white wine.

  2. Mix butter with flour.

  3. Add the butter‑flour mixture to the stew.

Make and fry the brain cakes

  1. Soak the brains in hot water.

  2. Beat the brains with eggs, flour, lemon peel, and chopped herbs.

  3. Form the mixture into small cakes.

  4. Fry the cakes in hot hog's lard until brown.

Serve

  1. Remove the hash from the pan with a fish slice and place on a dish.

  2. Strain the gravy over the hash.

  3. Garnish with mushrooms, force‑meat balls, hard‑boiled egg yolks, brain cakes, lemon, and pickles.

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. Anchovy + ketchuptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together479 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + walnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,149 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + white winetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  5. Pepper + walnuttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,039 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's head
Forms the main body of the hash, providing the meat that is sliced and stewed.
Butter
Combined with flour to thicken the stew, adding richness and body to the gravy.
Eggs
Bind the brain mixture so it holds together when formed into cakes.
Flour
Thickens the gravy with butter and helps bind the brain cakes.
Walnut ketchup
Adds a sharp, savoury depth of flavour to the stew.
Truffles or morels
Contribute a earthy, aromatic flavour to the stew.

The step that matters

Frying the brain cakes in hot lard until brown. Frying in hot fat sets the egg-bound outside quickly and browns it, so the cakes hold their shape. If the fat is not hot enough, the cakes absorb grease and may break apart.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (anchovy, pepper, lemon, walnut, ketchup, truffle, white wine):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against anchovy, pepper, lemon, walnut, ketchup, truffle, white wine. 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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