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Fricassee of Veal Gristles

A stew of veal gristles cooked with peas, lettuce, onion, herbs, and a creamy sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Fricassee of Veal Gristles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the peas and lettuce

  1. Combine liquor, green peas, and chopped lettuce in a pan; let stew over low heat, shaking often.

Coat and fry the gristles

  1. Glaze gristles with egg, then roll in bread crumbs, minced parsley, pepper, and salt.

  2. Fry coated gristles in hot oil until golden brown; drain on paper towels.

Make the sauce

  1. In a separate pot, scald gristles with a little gravy, onion, thyme, and parsley; stew until tender.

  2. Remove gristles, strain and skim sauce, then return sauce to pot.

  3. Mix flour with cream and add to sauce; season with mace or nutmeg.

  4. Beat egg yolks, add a little sauce, return to pot and stir.

Serve

  1. Place gristles in serving dish, pour sauce over, season with salt to taste.

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. Thyme + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Lettuce + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,483 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Peas + lettucetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,293 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isobutyl-3-methoxypyrazine (green bell pepper, earthy).

  5. Lettuce + thymetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together247 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Thickens the cream and sauce so it becomes smooth and clings to the gristles.
Egg yolks
Enriches and thickens the sauce, giving it a richer, silkier body.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth texture to the sauce.
Green peas
Contribute sweetness and body to the stewed vegetable base.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks. Egg yolks thicken when heated gently but can scramble if they meet hot liquid directly. Tempering them with a little sauce first, then returning them to the pot over low heat, keeps the sauce smooth.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lettuce, veal, onion, clove, thyme, parsley, flour):

  1. Lentilsfits better
  2. Chickpeafits better
  3. Chestnutfits better
  4. Peasthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lettuce, veal, onion, clove, thyme, parsley, flour. 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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