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Veal and Ham Pie

A cold pie filled with veal, ham, hard‑boiled eggs, and stock that sets into a jellied consistency.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Allspice and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 7,874 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Veal and Ham Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Make a thick stock using the veal bone, seasoning with bay leaves, onions, salt, and pepper.

  2. Cut the sliced veal and ham into strips about ½ inch wide.

Layer

  1. Layer the veal and ham in a crisscross pattern, leaving space between layers, then add a layer of sliced hard‑boiled eggs.

  2. Season each layer with salt, pepper, nutmeg, allspice, and cloves.

  3. Continue layering until the dish is full.

  4. If the stock has not jelled, add a little gelatin.

Bake and serve

  1. Fill the dish with the stock and cover with a rich pie crust, cutting a hole the size of a quarter in the middle.

  2. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for two hours.

  3. Fill the pie with stock.

  4. Let it cool.

  5. Serve the pie cold; it should be jellied.

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. Allspice + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Nutmeg + allspicetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,331 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Nutmeg + clovetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Pepper + allspicetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal knuckle
Its bone and collagen make a thick stock that will set into a jelly.
Sliced veal
Forms the meaty layers and gives the pie its main body and flavour.
Sliced ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour and contrast to the veal layers.
Hard boiled eggs
Add firm slices and richness that hold their shape between the meat layers.
Gelatin
Helps the stock set firmly so the cold pie slices cleanly.
Rich pie crust
Encloses the filling and holds in the stock while the pie bakes.

The step that matters

Getting the stock to jell. A cold pie holds its shape only if the stock sets. Collagen from the bones, with added gelatin if needed, forms a gel as it cools. Thin, unset stock will slump and leak when sliced.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, egg, pepper, nutmeg, allspice, clove):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, egg, pepper, nutmeg, allspice, clove. 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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