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Quenelles, Ragout of

Quenelles are small meatballs made from pounded meat, breadcrumbs, and seasonings, fried or poached and served with gravy or sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Quenelles, Ragout of

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Cut the meat into small pieces and pound it in a mortar.

  2. Mix the pounded meat with the bread crumbs, parsley, lemon rind, anchovy, salt, pepper, nutmeg, and garlic if using. Thoroughly combine the mixture with the clarified butter.

  3. Once cool, bind the mixture with the egg yolk.

  4. Form the mixture into walnut-sized balls.

Cook and serve

  1. Fry the balls in hot fat until firm, about 5 to 10 minutes, or poach them in boiling water.

  2. Drain the quenelles and place them on a hot dish.

  3. Pour rich brown gravy or white sauce over the quenelles. Squeeze lemon juice over the dish before serving.

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  5. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

What each ingredient does

Dressed meat, game, or poultry
Forms the main body of the quenelles and gives them a savory, meaty flavor.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and add bulk, helping the mixture hold its shape.
Egg yolk
Binds the mixture together so the quenelles hold their form when cooked.
Clarified butter
Adds fat and richness, keeping the quenelles tender and flavorful.
Anchovy
Contributes a deep, savory background flavor to the mixture.

The step that matters

Fry or poach until firm. Cooking the balls only until they are firm sets the egg yolk and binder while keeping the interior moist. Overcooking dries out the meat and bread, making the quenelles tough and crumbly.

Swap the clove

The recipe marks clove as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, bread, parsley, lemon, anchovy, pepper, nutmeg):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Winter savoryfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, bread, parsley, lemon, anchovy, pepper, nutmeg. 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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