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Forcemeat for Boned Fowl

A forcemeat mixture of ham, pork, veal, eggs, yolks, breadcrumbs, herbs, and seasonings for boned fowl.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Forcemeat for Boned Fowl

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Pass the veal, pork, and ham twice through a mincing machine.

  2. Rub the mixture through a wire sieve.

Combine and pound

  1. In a mortar, combine the hard-boiled yolks, parsley, thyme, shallot, seasoning, bread crumbs, and raw eggs.

  2. Pound all ingredients well together until mixed.

  3. If short on time, mix the minced meats with the other ingredients thoroughly instead of pounding.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

  3. Thyme + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

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

  5. Pork + vealtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,930 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Raw ham
Adds savory flavor and moisture to the forcemeat.
Fresh pork
Provides fat and richness that keep the forcemeat tender.
Veal
Contributes a delicate texture and mild flavor to the mixture.
Raw eggs
Bind the mixture so it holds together when cooked.
Hard-boiled egg yolks
Add richness and a smooth, creamy texture.

The step that matters

Pound all ingredients well together. Thorough pounding breaks the meat fibres and blends the binders evenly, giving a smooth, cohesive forcemeat. Under-mixing leaves streaks of uncombined meat and egg that can cook unevenly and crumble.

Swap the thyme

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (ham, pork, veal, egg, bread, parsley, shallot):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymethe original
  3. Marjoramfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against ham, pork, veal, egg, bread, parsley, shallot. 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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