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Meat Loaf

A loaf of mixed veal, beef, and pork seasoned with spices, topped with bacon, baked slowly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,380 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Meat Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a large bowl, combine veal, beef, pork, bay leaf, eggs, rolled crackers, chopped onion, cinnamon, ginger, sage, salt, and pepper.

Shape and bake

  1. Mix thoroughly and shape into a loaf.

  2. Lay strips of bacon on top of the loaf.

  3. Place in a baking dish and bake for 2½ hours, adding water as needed to keep moist.

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. Cinnamon + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Beef + porktop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,690 recipes

    Shared aroma: 12-methyltridecanal (tallowy, beefy).

  3. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  4. Cinnamon + sagetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together140 recipes

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

  5. Ginger + sagetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together157 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Adds a mild, tender meat base that blends with the beef and pork.
Beef
Provides a rich, savory flavour and substance to the loaf.
Pork
Adds fat, which keeps the loaf juicy as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the meat and cracker crumbs so the loaf holds its shape when sliced.
Crackers
Absorb juices and soften the texture, helping the loaf stay tender and moist.
Bacon
Renders fat over the top of the loaf, adding savoury flavour and browning.

The step that matters

Adding water during baking. Lean meat dries out over a long bake at low heat. Adding water as needed keeps the moisture in the loaf so it does not turn dry and crumbly.

Swap the cinnamon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, beef, pork, egg, onion, ginger, sage):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. Cinnamonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, beef, pork, egg, onion, ginger, sage. 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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