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Minced Veal

A savory ragout made from minced veal simmered in broth with herbs, ham, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Minced Veal

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Boil the bones and trimmings of the veal in 1½ cups of water for 2 hours to make broth.

  2. Strain the broth and let it cool, removing the fat.

Make the ragout

  1. Finely chop the white part of the veal, trimming away gristle and brown edges.

  2. Mix the veal with the broth, savory herbs, carrot or celery, mace, peppercorns, and ham.

  3. Thicken the gravy with 1½ teaspoons of flour mixed with butter.

  4. Season the mixture with salt, white pepper, nutmeg, and lemon rind.

  5. Heat the mixture gently without boiling, then serve with 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.

  1. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Carrot + nutmegtop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,424 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mace + white peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

White veal
Provides the minced meat that forms the body of the ragout.
Veal bones and trimmings
Release gelatin and flavour into the broth as they simmer, giving body to the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the gravy so the ragout holds together rather than running thin.
Butter
Adds richness and smoothness, and carries the flour into the gravy without lumps.
Ham
Adds savoury, salty depth that rounds out the veal's mild flavour.
Gravy
Supplies body and concentrated meaty flavour to the finished ragout.

The step that matters

Heating without boiling. Boiling a mixture with thickened gravy and fine meat can make the sauce separate or turn grainy and tough. Gentle heat keeps the texture smooth and the meat tender.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, carrot, mace, ham, flour, butter, nutmeg):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, carrot, mace, ham, flour, butter, nutmeg. 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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