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Mushroom Forcemeat, Vegetarian

A vegetarian forcemeat made from mushrooms, lemon, olive oil, bread crumbs, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Mushroom Forcemeat, Vegetarian

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Wash and chop the mushrooms.

  2. Heat the oil in an enamelled saucepan.

Make the forcemeat

  1. Add the mushrooms and lemon juice, stirring until they begin to soften.

  2. Stir in the mushroom ketchup, nutmeg, cayenne, white pepper, and salt.

  3. Add the soaked bread-crumbs and mix well.

  4. Remove from heat and let cool before using.

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. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Mushroom + olivetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,571 recipes

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

  4. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Lemon + olivetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Button mushrooms
Provide the main bulk and earthy flavour of the forcemeat.
Bread-crumbs soaked in milk
Absorb moisture and give the mixture a soft, binding body.
Olive oil
Carries flavour and softens the mushrooms while they cook.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds concentrated savoury, umami depth that reinforces the mushroom flavour.

The step that matters

Cooking the mushrooms until they begin to soften. Mushrooms are mostly water. If they are not cooked enough, their moisture releases later and makes the forcemeat wet and loose. Stop once they soften so the bread-crumbs can bind the mixture properly.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mushroom, lemon, olive, bread, milk, ketchup, pepper):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against mushroom, lemon, olive, bread, milk, ketchup, pepper. 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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