Skip to main content
Main

Veal Pot-pie

A stew of veal and potatoes topped with a dough crust, simmered until tender.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Veal Pot-pie

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the veal

  1. Wipe the veal with a damp towel and place it in a pot with cold water, cloves, salt, and pepper.

  2. Bring to a boil, skimming off any scum, then cover and simmer for 2 hours.

Add the potatoes and dumplings

  1. Peel the potatoes and soak them in cold water.

  2. After 2 hours, add the potatoes to the pot and bring to a boil.

  3. In a bowl, sift together flour, salt, and baking powder.

  4. Mix in enough cold milk or water to form a soft dough.

  5. Drop the dough into the pot on top of the veal and potatoes, either in one piece or by spoonfuls.

  6. Cover and boil for 20 minutes, then serve hot.

  7. For a richer gravy, stir in the egg yolks 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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  3. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  4. Clove + potatotop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,297 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Veal breast
Provides the meat and, as it simmers, the body of the broth.
Flour
Forms the dough that cooks into soft dumplings on top of the stew.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the dough so the dumplings rise and turn light.
Potatoes
Absorb flavor from the broth and add starch and body to the dish.
Egg yolks
Enrich the gravy with fat and emulsifiers, giving it a smoother, richer texture.

The step that matters

Drop the dough onto a simmering pot, then keep it covered. Covering traps steam so the dumplings cook through and rise. Lifting the lid lets steam escape and can leave them dense and gummy. Keep the liquid at a steady boil while they cook.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, pepper, potato, flour, milk, egg):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, pepper, potato, flour, milk, egg. 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

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesPotato RollsPotato Rolls78 recipesPotato ChipsPotato Chips53 recipesSweet Potato CroquettesSweet Potato Croquettes53 recipes