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A Cold Veal Pie

A pie of veal, minced ham, bacon, mushrooms, and spices, baked and served cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

A Cold Veal Pie

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 the forcemeat

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a mortar, pound the veal, ham, salt, pepper, spices, herbs, garlic, eggs, and gravy until well combined.

Layer the pie

  1. Cover the bottom of a pan with thin slices of bacon.

  2. Spread a layer of the forcemeat mixture over the bacon.

  3. Layer cutlets of veal on top, seasoning with pepper and minced mushrooms.

  4. Repeat layering until the pan is full, finishing with a layer of forcemeat.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake for 1 hour, then let it cool before serving.

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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Clove + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,663 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  3. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

  4. Ham + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Veal + mushroomtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,446 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Forms the main meaty body and firm, sliceable texture of the pie.
Minced ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour and some moisture to the forcemeat.
Eggs
Bind the pounded forcemeat so it holds together when baked and sliced.
Gravy
Adds moisture and body so the meat stays tender during baking.
Bacon
Lines the pan, adding fat and smoky flavour that seasons the pie from below.

The step that matters

Finishing with a layer of forcemeat. Repeating the layers until the pan is full and topping with forcemeat seals the cutlets. Egg-bound meat sets as it bakes, so a packed, even layering helps the pie hold its shape when cooled and sliced.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, ham, pepper, egg, meat, mushroom. 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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