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Veal Steaks

Thin veal steaks cooked with onion, pepper, salt, parsley, and butter, served with a gravy from veal scraps.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Veal Steaks

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the neck of veal into thin steaks and beat them to tenderize.

  2. Mix the chopped onion, pepper, salt, and parsley in a bowl.

  3. Melt the butter in a small saucepan, add the onion mixture, and stew over medium heat until browned.

Grill and serve

  1. Rub the grill with suet and place the steaks on it over hot coals.

  2. Broil the steaks well on one side, then turn them over.

  3. After turning, cover each steak with the onion mixture and continue broiling until fully cooked.

  4. For the gravy, boil the veal scraps in a little hot water, season with pepper and salt, and strain.

  5. Flavor the gravy with catchup 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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal neck
Forms the thin steaks that are beaten to tenderize and then broiled.
Onion
Softens and browns in butter, adding sweetness and savory depth to the topping.
Butter
Carries the onion into the pan and adds richness and browning.
Parsley
Adds fresh, herbal aroma to the onion topping.

The step that matters

Broil the steaks well on one side, then turn them over. Thin steaks cook quickly over hot coals, so the first side must brown well to build flavor, and the steak must be turned at the right moment to avoid drying or burning before the inside is done.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, pepper, parsley, butter, mushroom):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, pepper, parsley, butter, mushroom. 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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