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Sausage Loaf

A loaf made from veal, country sausage, powdered crackers, eggs, butter, salt, pepper, lemon rind, topped with breadcrumbs and bacon, baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon 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 ↓

Sausage Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. In a large bowl, mix the veal, country sausage, powdered crackers, beaten eggs, butter, salt, pepper, and lemon rind until well combined.

  3. Shape the mixture into an oval loaf and place it in a dripping pan.

Top and bake

  1. Sprinkle bread crumbs over the loaf and dot with bits of butter.

  2. Top with the two pieces of breakfast bacon.

  3. Bake for 2 hours, adding a little water and basting often.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  2. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides a lean, tender body that holds the loaf together with the sausage.
Country sausage
Supplies most of the fat and seasoning, keeping the loaf moist as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the mixture so the loaf sets firmly rather than crumbling when sliced.
Snowflake crackers
Absorb juices and add body, helping the loaf hold its shape and stay tender.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and browns on the surface under the bread crumbs.

The step that matters

Basting with water during the 2-hour bake. Meat loaf dries out over a long, low bake. Adding a little water and basting often keeps the surface moist and helps the loaf stay juicy inside.

“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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