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Turkey Loaf

A loaf made from chopped turkey remains, seasoned, bound with bread crumbs and egg, topped with salt pork, baked or steamed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Turkey and pork work together. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 830 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Turkey 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. Chop the turkey remains and season with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  2. Add 1 cup of soft bread crumbs and enough beaten egg to hold the mixture together.

Shape and bake

  1. Mold the mixture into a loaf or pack it in a greased mold.

  2. Cover the top with thin slices of salt pork.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) or steam until firm.

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. Turkey + porktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together830 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  2. Turkey + breadtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together822 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Bread + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,371 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Turkey + peppertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,636 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Turkey remains
Provides the main body and protein of the loaf.
Soft bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and keep the loaf tender rather than dense.
Beaten egg
Binds the mixture so it holds its shape when sliced.
Salt pork
Lays fat over the top, adding richness and browning as it bakes.

The step that matters

Binding the mixture with egg. Too little egg leaves the loaf crumbly and unable to hold shape, while packing it firmly before baking helps it set into a sliceable loaf as the egg proteins coagulate with heat.

“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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