Skip to main content
Main

Pork Scallops

A baked casserole of boiled pork, onion, cracker crumbs, and milk, topped with browned crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Pork Scallops

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

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

Assemble

  1. Layer boiled pork in a buttered dish and season.

  2. Add chopped onion and cover with cracker crumbs.

  3. Repeat layers until the dish is full.

  4. Pour milk over the top and cover tightly.

Bake and brown

  1. Bake for 30 minutes, then remove the cover and brown the top.

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

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

  2. Pork + oniontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

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

  3. Pork + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Boiled pork
Forms the main body of the dish and provides its savoury meaty flavour.
Cracker crumbs
Absorb the milk and help bind the layers into a soft, cohesive texture.
Milk
Provides moisture that softens the crumbs and cooks into a tender, creamy interior.
Butter
Greases the dish and adds richness and browning to the top.
Chopped onion
Adds aroma and a mild sweetness as it softens during baking.

The step that matters

Cover tightly, then uncover to brown. Keeping the cover on traps steam so the pork and milk cook through and stay moist. Removing it for the final stage lets surface moisture evaporate, allowing the top to brown rather than stew.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, butter, milk):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Onionthe original
  4. Asparagusfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, butter, milk. 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.

You might also like

Pork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes