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Veal Forcemeat

A mixture of finely chopped veal, bread, gravy, egg yolk, and butter, used as a filling.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Veal Forcemeat

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove fat and sinew from the veal, then chop and pound it well.

  2. Soak the bread crumb in veal gravy or white sauce, then press and drain it.

  3. Stir the soaked bread over gentle heat until dry and it forms a ball.

Combine

  1. Mix the hot bread with the egg yolk.

  2. Once cool, combine with the veal and add the fresh butter.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  3. Veal + breadtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,056 recipes

    Shared aroma: cis-3-hexenol (green, grassy).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Veal + buttertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,381 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

White veal
Provides the main body of the forcemeat as finely ground meat.
Stale bread crumb
Absorbs liquid and gives the forcemeat a light, binding structure.
Veal gravy or white sauce
Moistens the bread crumb so the mixture stays tender and juicy.
Egg yolk
Binds the mixture together and adds richness to the texture.
Fresh butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rich mouthfeel and moisture.

The step that matters

Drying the soaked bread over gentle heat. If the bread is not dried until it forms a ball, it stays wet and will loosen the forcemeat. Gentle heat dries it evenly without cooking or scorching it, so it binds well with the veal and egg yolk.

“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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