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Jelly of Meat

A gelatinous dish made by simmering beef, veal, bacon, and wine, then clarifying and straining the stock.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and carrot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,606 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Jelly of Meat

Ingredients

Directions

Make the stock

  1. Brown the beef, veal, bacon, and wine in a pot.

  2. Add the stock, another glass of wine, carrot, spices, and herbs.

  3. Stew until the meat is tender and falls apart.

Clarify and finish

  1. Pass the mixture through a fine sieve or tamis.

  2. Add the beaten egg white to clarify the stock.

  3. Strain through a jelly bag and season to taste.

  4. Let it cool, then skim off the fat.

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. Beef + carrottop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,606 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Beef + vealtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,784 recipes

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

  3. Beef + hamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,729 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Veal + carrottop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,015 recipes

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

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

Beef
Breaks down during stewing to give the stock its rich, meaty body.
Veal knuckle
Adds gelatin from bones and connective tissue, helping the stock set firm when chilled.
Bacon or ham knuckle-bone
Contributes smoky, salty savour and additional gelatin to the stock.
Egg white
Coagulates during heating and traps suspended particles, clearing the stock.

The step that matters

Adding the beaten egg white to clarify the stock. The egg white must be fully mixed in before heating so it can coagulate and trap fine particles. If the stock is stirred vigorously after it begins to simmer, the clarified layer can break up and cloud the liquid.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, veal, ham, wine, egg):

  1. Tomatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Onionfits about as well
  4. Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, veal, ham, wine, egg. 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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