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Veal Pudding

A steamed pudding made with veal, bacon, thyme, and gravy, wrapped in suet crust and a pastry lid.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,585 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Veal Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Melt the butter in a clean frying pan over low heat.

  2. Add the veal, bacon, thyme, pepper, and salt; cook for about 10 minutes.

  3. Add warm water, bring to a boil, then let it cool.

Assemble the pudding

  1. Line a pudding dish with the suet crust.

  2. Layer the veal and bacon in the dish and pour the gravy over it.

  3. Roll out the paste to form a lid, place it on top, and seal the edges with your thumb.

Cook

  1. Tie the dish in a pudding cloth and place it in a saucepan of boiling water.

  2. Keep boiling for about 1 hour until done.

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. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  2. Butter + thymetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,758 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

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

  5. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender during the long, gentle simmer.
Suet crust
Forms the sealed case that holds the filling and keeps it moist while steaming.
Bacon
Adds savoury fat and smoky flavour that seasons the meat as it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and helps brown the veal at the start of cooking.

The step that matters

Sealing the lid. If the edges are not sealed well, steam and juices can escape during the long boil and the filling may dry out or the water may seep in. A firm seal keeps the pudding moist and contained.

Swap the thyme

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Thymethe original

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