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Preserve

Veal Potted

A preserved meat mixture of veal and ham, seasoned with cayenne, mace, salt, and butter, set in clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Veal and ham are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,264 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Veal Potted

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mince the veal and ham together as finely as possible.

Pot and store

  1. Pound the mixture in a mortar with cayenne, salt, pounded mace, and fresh butter until smooth.

  2. Press the mixture into potting pots and cover with clarified butter.

  3. Store in a cool place; it will remain good for several days.

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

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

  2. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

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

  4. Veal + macetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,761 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  5. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 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
Forms the main body of the paste, giving it a tender, spreadable texture once pounded.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and moisture, helping the pounded mixture become smooth and spreadable.
Ham
Contributes savoury, salty flavour to the paste.

The step that matters

Pounding until smooth. Pounding breaks the minced meat into fine particles and works the butter evenly through it. If the mixture is left coarse, the paste will be grainy and the butter may separate rather than bind into a smooth texture.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, ham, pepper, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, pepper, butter. 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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