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Minced Veal on Toast

A toasted bread topped with a mixture of minced veal, butter, eggs, cream sauce, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Minced Veal on Toast

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the veal

  1. Combine minced veal, butter, salt, and pepper in a bowl.

Make the sauce

  1. Beat the eggs and mix with the cream sauce in another bowl.

  2. Stir the veal mixture into the cream sauce and add a little grated nutmeg.

Cook and serve

  1. Cook for 5 minutes.

  2. Serve the mixture on toasted bread.

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

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

  2. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. 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

Cold cooked veal
Forms the main body of the dish and gives it its savoury flavour.
Eggs
Set with gentle heat to bind the mixture and give it body.
Cream sauce
Adds moisture and creaminess so the veal stays tender.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour through the mixture.

The step that matters

Cook for 5 minutes. The beaten eggs set as they heat, thickening the mixture. Too much heat or time can overcook the eggs, making them grainy or curdled, so watch the mixture closely.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, butter, pepper, egg, cream, sauce, bread):

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, butter, pepper, egg, cream, sauce, bread. 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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