Why it works: Egg and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓
Veal Cutlets, a LA Fried Oysters
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Dry the veal pieces with a towel and season with salt.
Set out the beaten egg and rolled crackers in separate dishes.
Dip each piece of veal in the egg, then coat with the rolled crackers.
Fry and make gravy
Heat enough lard or butter in a skillet to nearly cover the cutlets.
Fry the cutlets until golden brown.
To make gravy, add a little boiling water to the skillet after the meat is done.
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.
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Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together118,967 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Veal + buttertop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,381 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Veal + eggtop 28% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together6,845 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
- Is the main meat that is cooked into the cutlets.
- Beaten egg
- Binds the cracker coating to the veal so it adheres during frying.
- Rolled crackers
- Form a crisp, browned crust around the veal when fried.
- Lard or butter
- Conducts heat for frying and adds richness and browning to the crust.
The step that matters
Coating the veal evenly. Dipping in egg and then coating with fine crumbs must cover each piece fully, because gaps let the meat dry out and the crust separate or burn during frying.
“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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