Skip to main content
Main

Veal Loap

A loaf of veal and pork mixed with eggs, cracker crumbs, and seasonings, baked until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Pepper and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,388 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Veal Loap

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 veal and pork finely.

  2. In a bowl, combine the chopped meat with beaten eggs, cracker crumbs, salt, pepper, and sage. Mix well and shape into a loaf.

Bake and serve

  1. Place in a baking dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for nearly an hour.

  2. Baste with a mixture of butter and water during baking.

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. Pepper + sagetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

  2. Veal + porktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,930 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  3. Pork + sagetop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,527 recipes

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

  4. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

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

  5. Veal + sagetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together670 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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 structure of the loaf.
Pork
Adds fat and moisture, keeping the loaf from drying out as it bakes.
Eggs
Bind the meat and crumbs together and help the loaf set firm when cooked.
Cracker crumbs
Absorb juices and hold the loaf together, helping it keep its shape.

The step that matters

Baste during baking. Lean meat can dry out in the oven. Basting with butter and water adds moisture and fat to the surface, helping keep the loaf tender and juicy.

Swap the sage

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

  1. Parsleyfits about as well
  2. Sagethe original
  3. Thymefits less well
  4. Nutmegfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, egg, pork, pepper, 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.

More veal loaf recipes

You might also like