Name: Veal Cake
Ingredients: 6 to 8 hard-boiled eggs; chopped parsley; slices of veal; slices of ham; water; 1 ounce butter; pepper; salt

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Veal Cake

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

Cut the hard-boiled eggs in half and place some yolk pieces in the bottom of a pot.
Layer with chopped parsley, slices of veal, and ham.
Add more egg pieces, parsley, pepper, and salt until the pot is full.
Pour in enough water to cover the ingredients and add the butter on top.

Bake and serve

Cover the pot with double paper.
Bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 1 hour.
Press the mixture together with a spoon.
Let it cool.
Optionally, place it in a small mold to serve beautifully as a side dish.

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.

Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together28,563 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,264 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,475 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Egg + hamtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,526 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled eggs: Provide structure and body, binding the layers together as the cake sets.
Veal: Supplies the meaty bulk and savory flavor of the cake.
Ham: Adds salty, savory flavor that complements the veal and eggs.
Butter: Adds fat and richness, carrying flavor and keeping the layers moist.

“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.