Why it works: Egg and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22,662 recipes. Both carry (e)-2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Veal Cutlets
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the cutlets
Wipe the cutlets and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
Dip the cutlets in beaten egg, then coat with bread or cracker crumbs.
Fry and serve
Fry the cutlets in drippings until browned on both sides.
Place the cutlets on a platter.
Add a little water to the pan gravy and thicken with flour mixed with water.
Strain the gravy if it is not smooth.
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 + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,964 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Veal + breadtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,056 recipes
Shared aroma: cis-3-hexenol (green, grassy).
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Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together50,459 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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 cutlets
- Lean meat that is cooked through and served as the main portion.
- Egg
- Binds the crumb coating so it adheres to the meat during frying.
- Bread or cracker crumbs
- Forms a crisp, browned crust around the cutlets.
- Flour
- Thickens the pan gravy as it is mixed with water and stirred in.
The step that matters
Fry the cutlets until browned on both sides. Frying in hot drippings browns the crumb coating through Maillard reactions, which creates flavor and a crisp crust. Too little heat leaves the coating pale and soggy.
“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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