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To Pot Veal or Chicken

A meat loaf of veal or chicken with ham, butter, flour, and eggs, baked in a mold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

To Pot Veal or Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Pound the cold veal or chicken until fine.

  2. Season with salt and pepper.

Layer and make the sauce

  1. Layer the meat with layers of pounded or shredded ham in a mold.

  2. Press each layer down and cover with melted butter.

  3. Make a sauce with veal gravy, butter, and flour.

Assemble and set

  1. Mix the meat with the sauce and pour it hot into the mold lined with sliced hard-boiled eggs.

  2. Let it cool and turn out when set.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

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

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

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

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Veal or chicken
Forms the main body of the dish, giving it its substance once pounded and set.
Ham
Adds savoury flavour and a layered texture between the meat.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and helping the sauce and layers hold together.
Flour
Thickens the sauce so it binds the meat and helps the mixture set when cooled.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add structure and a firm, pale contrast when sliced in the mold.

The step that matters

Pouring the hot mixture into the lined mold. The sauce is thickened with flour and gelatine-rich gravy sets as it cools, so the mixture must be firm enough to hold its shape. Pouring it too cool may leave gaps around the eggs, while letting it cool fully before turning out is needed for a clean release.

“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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