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Veal Cutlets with Macaroni

Veal cutlets served with macaroni in a catsup gravy, garnished with thyme, lemon juice, and paprika.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,973 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Veal Cutlets with Macaroni

Ingredients

Directions

Make the macaroni

  1. Add macaroni to boiling water in a pot and simmer for 30 minutes.

  2. Pour in cold water to prevent the macaroni from pulping, then add salt.

  3. Make gravy by thickening stock with flour and adding catsup.

  4. Drain the macaroni and mix it into the gravy.

Coat and fry the cutlets

  1. Dip veal cutlets in beaten eggs, then coat them with bread crumbs.

  2. Fry the cutlets in hot fat until browned, then sprinkle with thyme and lemon juice.

Serve

  1. Serve the macaroni and cutlets on a hot dish, garnished with paprika.

  2. Serve the gravy in a small dish on the side.

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. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Flour + thymetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,721 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Bread + thymetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,993 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Veal cutlets
Provide the main meat, which browns in hot fat to form a savory crust.
Macaroni
Forms the starchy base that soaks up the gravy and gives the dish body.
Eggs
Bind the bread crumbs to the cutlets so the coating adheres during frying.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating on the outside of the cutlets when fried.
Flour
Thickens the stock into the gravy, giving it body.
Catsup
Adds sweetness and acidity to the gravy.

The step that matters

Fry the cutlets in hot fat until browned. If the fat is not hot enough, the breaded coating absorbs oil and turns greasy instead of crisp, and the cutlets may cook unevenly. Frying in properly hot fat sets the coating quickly and browns it.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, flour, egg, bread, lemon):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Thymethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, flour, egg, bread, lemon. 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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