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To Ragout Ox Palates

A ragout of ox palates simmered in gravy soup, wine, lemon, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: White wine and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,765 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity. The science ↓

To Ragout Ox Palates

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the palates

  1. Wash the ox palates and place them in cold water.

  2. Boil slowly until tender, then remove the black skin and cut into neat pieces.

Make the sauce

  1. In a stew pan, melt the butter and let it brown.

  2. Stir in the flour and cook for a moment.

  3. Pour in the gravy soup, add the onion, lemon juice, white wine, mace or nutmeg, mushroom ketchup, and anchovy sauce.

  4. Boil for 10 minutes, then strain the sauce back into the stew pan.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the palates and let them stew in the sauce until rich.

  2. Serve garnished with lemon.

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. White wine + mushroomtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,765 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Butter + white winetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,083 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

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

  5. Lemon + white winetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

What each ingredient does

Ox palates
Provide the main body of the ragout, becoming tender and gelatinous as they simmer.
Butter
Browns to add a nutty, toasted richness to the base of the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the sauce as it cooks with the butter and gravy.
Gravy soup
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, adding savoury depth.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma that brighten the rich sauce.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds concentrated savoury, umami flavour to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boil slowly until tender. Palates are rich in connective tissue that must break down into gelatin during slow simmering. Rapid boiling can toughen the surface and leave the meat firm, so a gentle simmer until fully tender is needed before the palates are cut and added to the sauce.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, onion, lemon, white wine, mushroom, ketchup):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, onion, lemon, white wine, mushroom, ketchup. 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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