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Dessert

Calves' Feet Jelly

A gelatinous dessert made from calves' feet, lemon, sugar, spices, sherry, brandy, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Cinnamon and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Calves' Feet Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

  1. Combine 4 calves' feet and 4 quarts of water in a large pot.

  2. Boil on low heat until the meat separates from the bones and the liquid reduces by half.

  3. Strain the mixture carefully.

  4. Let it cool overnight.

  5. Remove the feet and any sediment.

Make the jelly

  1. Add the rind and juice of 2 lemons, 1½ pounds of white sugar, 1 stick of cinnamon, a little nutmeg, 1 pint of sherry wine, and ½ teacup of brandy.

  2. Beat the whites of 10 eggs until frothy.

  3. Add the beaten egg whites and their shells to the mixture.

  4. Boil for 10 minutes.

  5. Add 1 teacup of cold water.

  6. Strain the mixture through a flannel bag that has been dipped in boiling water.

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. Cinnamon + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Sherry + brandytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  4. Lemon + cinnamontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Wine + brandytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,427 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Calves' feet
Their collagen releases gelatin during long simmering, which lets the liquid set into a jelly.
White sugar
Adds sweetness and body to the jelly.
Egg whites
As they heat, they gather fine particles and sediment, clarifying the liquid.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the sugar.
Sherry wine
Adds aroma and depth of flavour to the jelly.

The step that matters

Add the beaten egg whites and boil for 10 minutes. The egg whites coagulate as they heat and trap sediment and cloudiness. Stirring them in gently and then straining through a flannel bag gives a clear jelly rather than a murky one.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, sherry, wine, brandy, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Applefits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, sherry, wine, brandy, egg. 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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