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Quenelles of Veal

Veal quenelles cooked in boiling water and served with white sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Quenelles of Veal

Ingredients

Directions

Make the panada

  1. Melt the butter or fat in a saucepan.

  2. Add the flour and stock. Stir.

  3. Cook until the mixture forms a compact mass around the spoon.

  4. Set aside to cool.

Make the mixture

  1. Pass the veal through a mincing machine or chop it finely.

  2. Pound the panada and the meat together until smooth.

  3. Add the eggs one at a time.

  4. Season to taste.

  5. Pound well together.

  6. Rub the mixture through a wire sieve.

Shape and cook

  1. Shape into quenelles using two dessert spoons. Dip one spoon into boiling water. Fill it with the mixture. Shape it into an oval. Scoop the mixture into the second spoon.

  2. Place in a greased sauté pan.

  3. Pour in enough boiling water to nearly cover the quenelles.

  4. Cover with a greased sheet of paper.

  5. Cook gently for about 30 minutes.

  6. Drain and arrange in a circle or straight row.

  7. Mask with a good white sauce.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the main lean meat body that the quenelles are built around.
Flour
Forms the panada with the stock, giving the mixture body and holding it together.
Butter or good fat
Enriches the panada and adds richness and flavour to the quenelles.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm when cooked.
Stock
Moistens the panada so it forms a smooth, workable paste.

The step that matters

Rub the mixture through a wire sieve. Pressing the mixture through a sieve breaks down fibres and lumps, giving the smooth, fine texture a quenelle needs. Skipping it leaves a coarse, grainy result.

“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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