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Forcemeat for Game Pie

A seasoned mixture of veal, liver, bacon, mushrooms, and spices used as filling for game pie.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 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 Game Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Make the crumb base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add parsley, thyme, salt, lemon peel, nutmeg, cayenne, and mace.

  3. Stir in the veal and stew gently for 12 to 15 minutes, then remove the veal.

  4. Add bread crumbs to the saucepan and let them absorb the gravy, stirring until dry.

  5. While hot, mix in the beaten egg yolk with the bread crumbs.

  6. Set the mixture aside to cool.

Prepare the meats and vegetables

  1. Boil or stew the livers separately with the veal.

  2. Chop and stew the mushrooms with the veal.

  3. Mince the veal finely.

  4. Pound together the veal, livers, and mushrooms.

Finish the forcemeat

  1. Add the cooled bread mixture and beat well.

  2. Incorporate the butter and rasped bacon.

  3. Finally, add the beaten egg yolks and mix thoroughly.

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 + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  3. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  4. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Thyme + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,907 recipes

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

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 and texture of the forcemeat.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the gravy and give the forcemeat body and a firm, sliceable structure.
Eggs
Bind the mixture together and help it set when cooked.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, carrying the seasonings through the mixture.
Bacon
Adds savory fat and flavor that enriches the forcemeat.
Livers of birds
Add richness and a deeper, earthy flavor to the forcemeat.

The step that matters

Drying the bread crumbs in the gravy. Stirring the crumbs until dry lets them absorb the gravy fully. Crumbs left wet make the forcemeat soggy and weak, so it will not hold together when cooked.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, butter, parsley, thyme, lemon, nutmeg, bread):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Winter savoryfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, butter, parsley, thyme, lemon, nutmeg, bread. 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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