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Aspic Jelly

Aspic jelly is a gelatinized meat stock made from chicken, beef, veal, and vegetables, set with gelatin and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Aspic Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Combine the chicken, beef, and veal in a pot and cover with cold water. Boil for 5 hours.

  2. Add the carrot, cloves, turnip, and bay leaf one hour before finishing.

  3. Fry the chopped onions and celery in butter, then add them to the pot.

  4. Remove from heat and strain the mixture.

Clarify and set

  1. Stir in the gelatin and sherry, then strain again.

  2. Let the mixture sit overnight, then remove all fat.

  3. Beat the egg whites to stiff peaks and mix with the cold jelly.

  4. Heat and bring to a boil once more, then strain through a cloth.

  5. Pour into a fancy jelly mold.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,418 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  5. Clove + carrottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the clear stock into a firm jelly once chilled.
Egg whites
Bind to impurities in the stock so they can be strained out, clarifying it.
Sherry wine
Adds flavour and acidity to the jelly.
Chicken
Releases collagen and savoury flavour into the stock as it simmers.
Beef shin
Adds collagen and deep meaty flavour that gives the stock body.
Veal knuckle
Adds collagen and gelatinous body to the stock.

The step that matters

Beating the egg whites into the cold jelly. Egg whites must be whipped to stiff peaks and mixed in cold so they can trap particles and clouds. Heating the stock afterward lets them coagulate and filter out, leaving the jelly clear.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, beef, veal, onion, carrot, celery, turnip):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, beef, veal, onion, carrot, celery, turnip. 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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