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Veal and Ham Moulded

A chilled veal and ham dish set in gelatin with parsley and hard‑boiled eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 28,563 recipes. Both carry trans-2-hexenal, which smells green, leafy. The science ↓

Veal and Ham Moulded

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Place the veal and ham slices in a saucepan and cover with water.

  2. Simmer for 1 hour.

  3. Soak the gelatine in 1 cup of cold water, then add it to the mixture with the parsley.

  4. Add the chopped parsley 5 minutes before removing from heat.

Set and serve

  1. Butter a mould and line the sides and bottom with the sliced hard‑boiled eggs.

  2. Pour the veal and ham mixture into the mould.

  3. Refrigerate overnight to set.

  4. Turn out onto a dish to serve.

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. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  2. Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,264 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

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

  4. Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the main meat body and flavour that the mould is built around.
Ham
Adds savoury flavour and salt to the meat mixture.
Gelatine
Sets the cooking liquid so the mould holds its shape when turned out.
Hard boiled eggs
Form a decorative lining and add firmness and contrast in each slice.

The step that matters

Soaking and adding the gelatine. Gelatine must be fully softened in cold water before it is stirred into the hot mixture so it dissolves evenly. Undissolved clumps will not set properly and can leave the mould weak or grainy.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, egg, butter):

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, egg, butter. 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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