Why it works: Onion and mace are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,078 recipes. Both carry eugenol, which smells clove, spicy. The science ↓
Jellied Meat
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the gelatine
Dissolve the gelatine in a little of the cold stock.
Add the dissolved gelatine to the hot broth and stir until completely dissolved.
Make the meat mixture
Mix the seasonings into the chopped meat thoroughly.
Pour the stock mixture over the meat and mix again.
Mold and set
Mold the mixture in a brick or oval-shaped mold.
Chill in a cold place until set, then serve on a garnished dish.
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.
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Onion + macetop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together7,078 recipes
Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).
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Meat + oniontop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,364 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Meat + macetop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,339 recipes
Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cooked meat
- Forms the body of the dish and gives it its main flavour.
- Powdered gelatine
- Sets the liquid into a firm, sliceable jelly as it cools.
- Meat stock
- Adds moisture and savoury flavour, and carries the gelatine through the mixture.
The step that matters
Dissolving the gelatine completely. Undissolved gelatine grains do not set evenly and leave gritty or rubbery spots. Dissolving it fully in liquid first lets the protein network form uniformly as the mixture chills.
Swap the mace
The recipe marks mace as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, onion):
- Garlicfits better
- Thymefits better
- Cuminfits better
- Macethe original
Fit is the average pairing score against meat, onion. 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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