Name: Cold Veal or Chicken Pie
Ingredients: 1 pie crust; 2 cups shredded cold veal or chicken; 1 cup lean ham, shredded; ¼ cup cream; ¼ teaspoon white pepper; ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper; ¼ teaspoon salt; ¼ teaspoon nutmeg; 1 small shallot, finely chopped

Why it works: Nutmeg and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,019 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Cold Veal or Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point. The book gives no cooking times either; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).
Lay the pie crust into a shallow tart dish.
In a bowl, combine the shredded veal or chicken, ham, cream, white pepper, cayenne pepper, salt, nutmeg, and shallot.

Bake and serve

Fill the crust with the mixture.
Cover with another layer of crust.
Bake until golden brown, about 25-30 minutes.
If desired, bake with a piece of bread inside to keep the crust hollow.
Warm the remaining filling with a little cream and pour it into the baked crust.

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.

Nutmeg + shallottop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,019 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together13,015 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Pepper + shallottop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,898 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
White pepper + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together1,375 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Cream + nutmegtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,920 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

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

What each ingredient does

Shredded veal or chicken: Provides the main meat filling, giving the pie its body and substance.
Lean ham: Adds savory, salty flavor that complements the poultry or veal.
Cream: Adds moisture and richness to the filling, keeping it tender when baked.
Shallot: Contributes a mild, sweet onion-like aroma to the filling.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, cream, pepper, nutmeg, shallot):

Parsleyfits better
Tarragonfits better
Capersfits better
White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, cream, pepper, nutmeg, shallot. 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.