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Meat Jelly

A gelatin made from simmered chicken, veal, and beef with isinglass, sherry, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Chicken and beef match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,148 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Meat Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Remove the skin and fat from the chicken, veal, and beef, and cut the meat into small pieces.

Make the stock

  1. Place the meat in a saucepan with ½ pint of water and a little salt, and simmer near the fire for 2 hours.

  2. In another saucepan, add the veal bone and chicken bones with 1 pint of water and a little salt, and boil slowly for 4 hours.

Clarify and set

  1. Strain the liquid from both saucepans into a basin and add the dissolved isinglass.

  2. Strain again through muslin until clear, then stir in the sherry.

  3. Pour the mixture into a mold and place it in a cool area to 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. Chicken + beeftop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,148 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Veal + beeftop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Chicken + vealtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-butanedione (buttery, creamy).

  4. Chicken + sherrytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together891 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  5. Beef + sherrytop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together871 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Adds savory flavor and body to the stock as it simmers.
Veal
Contributes gelatin-rich collagen that gives the stock body once chilled.
Isinglass
Gelatin-like protein that sets the strained liquid into a firm jelly.
Gravy beef
Adds deep meaty flavor to the stock during long, gentle simmering.
Sherry
Adds aroma and a touch of acidity and sweetness to the clear jelly.

The step that matters

Strain again through muslin until clear. Cloudiness comes from fine particles and fat left in the stock. Thorough straining and removing fat give a clear, glossy aspic rather than a murky one.

“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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