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To Make Forcemeat

A mixture of veal, ham, beef suet, bread crumbs, herbs, spices, and eggs, ground into a smooth paste.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and winter savory match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 780 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

To Make Forcemeat

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a mortar, combine veal, ham, beef suet, and bread crumbs.

  2. Add chopped parsley, lemon thyme, winter savory, lemon peel, nutmeg, mace, pepper, and salt.

  3. Pound all ingredients together until smooth.

  4. Mix in the raw eggs until fully incorporated.

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. Thyme + winter savorytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together780 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  4. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  5. Parsley + winter savorytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together863 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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 forcemeat its body and texture.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the forcemeat moist and tender as it cooks.
Bread crumbs
Absorb fat and moisture, helping the mixture hold together and stay light.
Raw eggs
Bind the ingredients together so the forcemeat sets firm when cooked.
Ham
Contributes savory, salty flavor to the meat base.

The step that matters

Pound all ingredients together until smooth. Thorough pounding breaks the meat and fat into a fine, even paste, which gives a smooth texture and helps the mixture bind evenly once the eggs are added.

“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.

More forcemeat recipes

Balls 27Fish 25Veal 24Chestnut 18Hare 17Suet 13 See all 56 →

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