Name: Scollops of Cold Veal or Chicken
Ingredients: Cold veal or chicken, minced; ⅛ teaspoon nutmeg; ¼ teaspoon pepper; ¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt; 2 tablespoons cream; Bread crumbs; Butter

Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Scollops of Cold Veal or Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Mince the meat extremely small.
In a pan, combine the minced meat with nutmeg, pepper, salt, and cream.
Heat the mixture for a few minutes.

Assemble and brown

Place the mixture into scallop shells.
Fill the shells with bread crumbs and dot with butter.
Brown the shells before the fire or under a broiler.

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.

Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together13,015 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Nutmeg + creamtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together7,920 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Nutmeg + breadtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,997 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal or chicken: Forms the main body of the filling, providing protein structure once minced and heated.
Cream: Adds moisture and richness, keeping the minced meat tender rather than dry.
Bread crumbs: Form a crisp topping that browns under heat.
Butter: Adds fat that melts over the crumbs, aiding browning and flavor.

The step that matters

Brown the shells before the fire or under a broiler. Bread crumbs and butter brown quickly under strong direct heat, so watch closely to get golden color without scorching the crumbs or drying the filling beneath.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, pepper, cream, bread, butter):

Nutmegthe original
Parsleyfits about as well
Sagefits about as well
Celeryfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, pepper, cream, bread, butter. 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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Scollops of Cold Veal or Chicken