Why it works: Truffle and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,900 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Ox Cheek Pie
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the filling
Bake the ox cheek with seasoning until tender, but not overcooked.
Remove all flesh, kernels, and fat from the cheek and cut into pieces.
Assemble the pie
Make a thick puff pastry and line a deep dish with it.
Layer the meat in the dish with truffles, morels, egg yolks, mushrooms, and forcemeat balls.
Season with salt and pepper, then pour in the gravy.
Cover with a pastry crust and bake until the top is golden brown.
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.
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Truffle + mushroomtop 4% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,900 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).
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Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,580 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Truffle + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,604 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + mushroomtop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,987 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Pepper + truffletop 26% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together2,106 recipes
Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Ox cheek
- Slow-cooked meat that becomes tender and forms the main body of the filling.
- Puff pastry
- Forms a crisp, buttery crust that holds the filling and browns in the oven.
- Hard-boiled egg yolks
- Add richness and a creamy, crumbly texture to the filling.
- Truffles
- Contribute a strong earthy aroma that flavours the filling.
- Morels
- Add a meaty, earthy flavour and chewy texture to the filling.
The step that matters
Bake the ox cheek until tender, but not overcooked. Collagen in the cheek breaks down into gelatin during slow cooking, giving tenderness and body. Overcooking dries out the meat fibres, leaving the filling tough and stringy after it is baked again in the pie.
“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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