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 ↓
Rolled Veal
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the veal
Bone the breast of veal and spread veal forcemeat over the inside.
Sprinkle the forcemeat with pickled gherkin.
Place a slice of lean uncooked ham on top.
Roll the veal tightly and tie it with string to secure.
Cook and serve
Put the rolled veal in a stewpan, cover with stock, and simmer gently for 3 hours.
Serve cold.
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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Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,264 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Breast of veal
- Forms the main body of the roll and becomes tender with long, gentle simmering.
- Veal forcemeat
- Adds a soft, moist filling that fills the cavity inside the rolled meat.
- Pickled gherkin
- Adds acidity and sharp flavour that cuts through the rich meat and forcemeat.
- Ham
- Adds savoury, salty flavour inside the roll.
- Stock
- Keeps the meat moist and adds flavour as it simmers.
The step that matters
Simmer gently for 3 hours. At a boil, the muscle fibres tighten and toughen and the outside can break apart. A gentle simmer lets the connective tissue soften slowly, keeping the veal tender and moist.
“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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