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Veal and Oyster Pie

A savory pie of veal, oysters, and ham in a pastry crust, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and biscuit match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 889 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Veal and Oyster Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the veal

  1. Cut veal cutlets into small pieces and roll them in flour.

  2. Brown the veal in a little hot bacon fat.

  3. Cover the veal with boiling water or stock and simmer for about two hours.

  4. Transfer the veal to a baking dish.

Make the sauce

  1. Chop the cooked ham, moisten with stock, and pound smooth.

  2. Press the ham mixture through a sieve and add it to the remaining liquid with seasonings.

Assemble and bake

  1. Pour the mixture over the meat in the dish, adding oysters and a little butter.

  2. Cover with pastry or biscuit crust and bake at 400°F (200°C) for about twenty-five minutes.

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. Flour + biscuittop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together889 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Oyster + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,184 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  4. Ham + oystertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together360 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Oyster + biscuittop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together183 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender after long, gentle simmering.
Flour
Coats the veal so it browns well and helps thicken the cooking liquid.
Cooked ham
Adds savory flavor to the sauce, and pounding it smooth gives the sauce a fine texture.
Oysters
Add a briny, savory flavor that stands out in the finished pie.
Pastry or biscuit crust
Encloses the filling and bakes to a golden, crisp top.

The step that matters

Simmering the veal until tender. Veal cutlets need a long, gentle simmer in liquid to break down connective tissue. If the heat is too high, the meat can toughen, so keep it at a gentle simmer rather than a rolling boil.

“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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