Name: Veal and Ham
Ingredients: ham; veal; water; pepper

Why it works: Ham and veal are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,264 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Veal and Ham

Ingredients

ham
veal
water
pepper

Directions

Heat a frying pan over high heat.
Fry the ham without adding fat unless it is very lean.
Once cooked, place the ham on a serving dish.
In the same pan, cook the veal in the leftover juices until it is deep brown.
After the veal is done, add a little water to the pan to create gravy.
Season the gravy with pepper and pour it over the meat.

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.

Ham + vealtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,264 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,049 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ham + peppertop 23% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together6,058 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Ham: Fries in its own fat to give savoury, browned flavour to the dish.
Veal: Browns in the pan juices, developing deep colour and rich meaty flavour.

“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.