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Aspic Jelly

Aspic jelly is a gelatinous meat stock made with stock, spices, vegetables, egg whites, and gelatin.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Celery and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Aspic Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Soak the gelatine in water.

Make the aspic

  1. In a stewpan, combine stock or water, Lemco extract, cloves, peppercorns, celery (or celery salt), sherry (or chablis), egg whites and shells, carrot, turnip, onion, mace, lemon juice and rind, vinegar, and salt.

  2. Add the soaked gelatine and stir until melted.

  3. Whisk well until nearly boiling, then allow to boil twice.

  4. Simmer for half an hour.

Strain and set

  1. Pour through a scalded jelly bag or clean kitchen rubber until it runs clear.

  2. Allow to set before using.

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. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Clove + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, clear jelly as it cools.
Egg whites and shells
Bind with impurities as they heat, clarifying the liquid so it runs clear.
Stock or water
Forms the liquid base that the jelly is made from.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the jelly.
Tarragon and orleans vinegar
Adds acidity and aroma to the jelly.

The step that matters

Pour through a scalded jelly bag or clean kitchen rubber until it runs clear. Egg whites and shells must be strained out fully, since any cloudiness or particles left behind stay in the set jelly and spoil its clarity.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, clove, celery, sherry, egg, carrot, turnip):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Parsnipfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, clove, celery, sherry, egg, carrot, turnip. 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.

More aspic recipes

Chicken 77Meat 26Tomato 25Jelly 16Lobster 14Beef 10 See all 167 →

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