Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Veal Cutlets
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the veal
Beat the veal cutlets until the fibers are separated.
Brush the cutlets with egg yolk.
Coat and fry
Melt butter in a pan and warm the chopped parsley in it.
Cover the cutlets with the butter and herbs, then coat with bread crumbs.
Fry the cutlets until golden brown.
Press between paper to remove excess grease.
Serve
Serve with white sauce.
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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Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together28,563 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
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Bread + parsleytop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,588 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Veal + breadtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,056 recipes
Shared aroma: cis-3-hexenol (green, grassy).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Veal cutlets
- Form the main body of the dish; beating separates the fibers so the meat becomes more tender.
- Egg yolk
- Acts as a binding layer that helps the bread crumbs adhere to the cutlets.
- Bread crumbs
- Form a crisp outer coating that browns during frying.
- Butter
- Adds richness and helps the coating brown in the pan.
The step that matters
Fry the cutlets until golden brown. Frying over steady heat browns the crumb coating through the Maillard reaction while the thin cutlet cooks through. Too little heat leaves the coating pale and greasy, and too much burns it before the meat is done.
Swap the parsley
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, butter, egg, bread):
- Nutmegfits about as well
- Parsleythe original
- Capersfits about as well
- Sagefits less well
Fit is the average pairing score against veal, butter, egg, bread. 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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