Name: Veal Cake
Ingredients: slices of cooked veal; hard-boiled eggs, sliced; thin ham or tongue, or cooked sausages; gelatin; good gravy

Why it works: Veal and ham are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,264 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Veal Cake

Ingredients

Directions

Layer slices of cooked veal in a dish.
Add a layer of sliced hard-boiled eggs.
Add a layer of thin ham, tongue, or cooked sausages.
Fill the dish with more layers as needed.
Dissolve a little gelatin in good gravy and pour it over the layers.
If the gravy is insufficient, add more.
Let it cool and turn out when set.

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.

Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,264 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Egg + hamtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,526 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Veal + eggtop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together6,845 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Egg + gelatintop 28% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,449 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Ham + gelatintop 29% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together32 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).