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Force-meat Balls, for Hashes, &C

Meatballs made from veal, beef suet, herbs, and egg white, fried until light brown.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Force-meat Balls, for Hashes, &C

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meatballs

  1. Pound the veal and beef suet together in a mortar until well combined.

  2. Season the mixture with salt, pepper, and pounded herbs to your taste.

  3. Add the egg white and mix thoroughly.

  4. Roll the mixture into small balls without using flour.

Cook

  1. Fry the balls in a pan until they are light brown.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Veal + beeftop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

  3. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

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

  4. Veal + eggtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,845 recipes

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

  5. Beef + eggtop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 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

Veal
Provides the lean meat base that gives the meatballs their body and bite.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the meatballs moist and tender as they cook.
Egg white
Binds the mixture so the balls hold their shape during frying.

The step that matters

Rolling the balls without flour. Without flour to coat the surface, the mixture can stick to your hands and may fall apart. Keep the mixture cool and handle it gently, so the balls keep their shape and brown evenly in the pan.

“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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