Name: A Dunelm of Cold Veal or Fowl
Ingredients: small mushrooms; 2 tablespoons butter; 1 pound minced veal; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; ½ cup cream; 1 teaspoon flour; slices of bread

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 ↓

A Dunelm of Cold Veal or Fowl

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

Stew the mushrooms in their own liquid with 1 tablespoon of butter for 15 minutes.
Mince the mushrooms finely and add them with their liquid to the minced veal.
Season with pepper and salt, then mix in the cream and 1 teaspoon of butter rubbed with flour, and simmer for 3 to 4 minutes.

Serve

Serve on thin slices of toasted bread.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,525 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Mushroom + breadtop 10% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,536 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Minced veal: Forms the main body of the filling, giving it substance and a tender, meaty texture.
Cream: Adds moisture and richness, keeping the mixture soft and smooth as it simmers.
Butter: Adds fat and flavour, carrying the mushroom taste into the dish.
Flour: Thickens the butter and cream mixture so the filling holds together rather than running.

The step that matters

Mixing in the cream and butter-flour paste. Adding the butter rubbed with flour to the cream and simmering only briefly lets it thicken smoothly. If it boils hard or is added lumpy, the flour can clump and the sauce can turn grainy or separate.

“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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A Dunelm of Cold Veal or Fowl