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Meat Loaf and Tomato Sauce

A loaf of ground beef, pork, and veal mixed with butter, eggs, breadcrumbs, and seasonings, baked until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,690 recipes. Both carry 12-methyltridecanal, which smells tallowy, beefy. The science ↓

Meat Loaf and Tomato Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Mix and shape

  1. In a large bowl, combine the ground beef, pork, veal, butter, salt, and pepper.

  2. Add the beaten eggs, bread crumbs, water, and milk. Mix well.

  3. Shape the mixture into a loaf and place it in a baking dish.

Bake

  1. Bake for 2 hours until cooked through.

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

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

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  5. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Ground beef
Provides the main meaty body and fat that give the loaf its rich flavor.
Pork
Adds fat and tenderness, keeping the loaf moister than beef alone.
Veal
Contributes a soft, delicate texture to the mixed meat.
Eggs
Bind the meat together as they set during baking, giving the loaf structure.
Bread crumbs
Absorb liquid and hold fat and juices, helping the loaf stay tender.

The step that matters

Mixing in the eggs, crumbs, water and milk. Mixing the binders in thoroughly spreads them evenly through the meat. Overworking the mixture, however, makes the meat dense and tough, so mix only until combined.

“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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