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Veal Cake

A baked cake of minced veal and ham with breadcrumbs, spices, and mushroom ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,585 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Veal Cake

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 the filling

  1. Remove all the meat from the veal and mince it.

  2. Chop the bones and simmer them in a small quantity of water for 6 hours.

  3. Combine the minced veal, minced ham, flavorings, bread crumbs, and jelly from the bones in a bowl.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter a plain mold and line it with hard-boiled eggs, sliced.

  2. Pour the mixture into the mold and bake at 350°F (175°C) for 1 hour.

  3. Let it cool before turning it out.

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 + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  2. Onion + thymetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Ham + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

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

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the main meaty body that holds the cake together when cooled.
Ham
Adds savory, salty flavor and firmness to the mixture.
Eggs
Bind the mixture as it bakes and set it into a sliceable structure.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help the mixture hold its shape while baking.
Bones jelly (in the method)
Adds gelatin from the simmered bones, giving moisture and a firm setting when cooled.

The step that matters

Let it cool before turning it out. Cooling lets the egg and gelatin proteins set fully, so the cake firms up and holds its shape when unmolded instead of crumbling or slumping.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, egg, bread, onion, thyme, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Sagefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, egg, bread, onion, thyme, pepper. 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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