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Aspic Jelly

Aspic is a gelatinized meat stock made with gelatin, stock, beef, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,193 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Aspic Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the clarifying mixture

  1. Soak the gelatine in cold water until soft.

  2. In a six-quart stewpan, heat the white stock and add the optional chicken carcasses, salt, and color to taste.

  3. Once hot, add the swollen gelatine and stir until melted.

  4. Mince the gravy beef and place it in a basin.

  5. Add the egg whites to the minced beef and mix until compacted.

  6. Add the beef mixture to the stewpan and stir well.

  7. Add shredded onion, thyme, bay leaves, peppercorns, coriander seeds, and celery.

Clarify and set

  1. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.

  2. Cover the stewpan and let it sit in a warm place for 20 minutes to settle.

  3. Carefully pour the clear liquid through a clean flannel or muslin into a basin.

  4. The next morning, skim off the fat from the top; the remaining liquid will set into jelly.

Keep and finish

  1. Boil the jelly daily to prevent spoilage, clearing the surface of scum with clean paper.

  2. Add Madeira as needed, but do not mix it with the jelly stock.

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. Thyme + celerytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,193 recipes

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

  2. Chicken + beeftop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,148 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  3. Thyme + coriandertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together427 recipes

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

  4. Coriander + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together569 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the clarified stock into a firm, sliceable jelly as it cools.
Egg whites
Coagulate with the minced beef and trap impurities, clarifying the stock into a clear liquid.
Gravy beef
Adds meaty flavor to the stock and helps collect cloudiness during clarifying.
White stock
Forms the liquid base that becomes the jelly.

The step that matters

Pour the clear liquid through a clean flannel or muslin. Gentle pouring after the egg white raft has settled keeps the cleared stock from being disturbed. Disturbing the raft pushes cloudy particles back through, leaving the jelly hazy instead of clear.

Swap the coriander

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, beef, egg, onion, thyme, celery):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Corianderthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, beef, egg, onion, thyme, celery. 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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