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Veal Loaf

A loaf made from finely chopped veal or beef, eggs, milk, butter, crackers, pepper, and salt, baked until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Veal Loaf

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Mix and shape

  1. In a bowl, beat the eggs with the milk.

  2. Add the chopped meat, butter, powdered crackers, black pepper, and salt; mix well.

  3. Form the mixture into a loaf shape.

Bake

  1. Place the loaf in a baking dish and bake for 2.5 hours, basting with butter and water occasionally.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal or beef
Provides the main body and savory flavor of the loaf.
Eggs
Bind the meat and help the loaf hold its shape as it sets.
Powdered crackers
Absorb moisture and help keep the loaf tender rather than dense.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the meat during baking.

The step that matters

Basting during the long bake. Meat dries out over a long oven time, so occasional basting with butter and water adds moisture and helps keep the loaf juicy.

“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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