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Vol-au-yent of Sweetbreads

A pastry shell filled with sweetbread and butter sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Vol-au-yent of Sweetbreads

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the pastry

  1. On a clean surface, make a well in the flour and add the egg yolk and half the lemon juice.

  2. Gradually mix in the cold water and knead until firm.

  3. Roll out thinly.

  4. Place 5 oz of butter in the center of the rolled paste.

  5. Fold edges to cover the butter.

  6. Flour a rolling pin and roll out as thinly as possible.

  7. Fold into three layers and roll out again.

  8. Repeat the folding and rolling process seven times.

  9. Chill in the refrigerator until firm.

Prepare and cook the sweetbreads

  1. Wash the sweetbreads thoroughly.

  2. Place in a saucepan, cover with cold water and bring to a boil.

  3. Boil for 10 minutes.

  4. Transfer to cold water and re-wash.

  5. Cut into small pieces.

  6. In a saucepan, combine the remaining butter and milk over heat.

  7. When boiling, add sweetbread pieces.

  8. Season with cayenne and salt.

  9. Let simmer slowly for 1 hour.

Assemble and bake

  1. Roll out to about ⅓ inch thick.

  2. Cut out two vol-au-vent shapes with a cutter or biscuit cutter, then cut a smaller circle in each.

  3. Place on a baking tray.

  4. Bake in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 30 minutes.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

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

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Lemon + milktop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Flour
Forms the structure of the pastry once kneaded with water.
Butter
Creates separate flaky layers in the pastry as it melts and steams during baking.
Egg yolk
Adds richness and helps bind the dough, aiding its texture and colour.
Milk
Forms a creamy sauce that moistens the sweetbreads.
Sweetbreads
Provide the main filling, becoming tender during slow simmering.

The step that matters

Folding and rolling the butter into the dough. The butter must stay cold and separate from the dough between folds; if it softens or breaks through, the layers merge and the pastry will not rise into flaky layers.

“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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