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Calfs Head Fricasseed

A fricassee of calf's head with breadcrumbs, gravy, mushrooms, truffles, oysters and fried brain cakes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 25 ingredients
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Why it works: Marjoram and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,225 recipes. Both carry terpineol, which smells pine, woody. The science ↓

Calfs Head Fricasseed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the meat

  1. Clean and half-boil the calf's head.

  2. Cut the meat into small pieces and place in a dish.

  3. Wash the meat with egg yolks.

  4. Cover the meat with breadcrumbs mixed with herbs, pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

  5. Set the dish before the fire, turning occasionally until browned.

Make the sauce and stew

  1. In a pan, combine gravy, onion, herbs, salt, cayenne, shallot, sherry, and oyster liquor. Boil for a few minutes.

  2. Strain the sauce over the meat.

  3. Dredge the meat with flour.

  4. Add mushrooms, truffles, morels, ketchup, and half the brains mixed with butter and flour. Simmer the whole.

Fry and garnish

  1. Beat the remaining brains with lemon peel, nutmeg, mace, parsley, and egg. Fry the brain mixture in small cakes until golden brown.

  2. Dip oysters in egg yolk. Fry the oysters similarly, along with forcemeat balls made for mock-turtle.

  3. Garnish with fried cakes and hot bits of bacon.

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. Marjoram + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

  2. Basil + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together688 recipes

    Shared aroma: terpineol (pine, woody).

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

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Parsley + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Tarragon + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together148 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's head
Provides the main body of meat, which becomes tender through half-boiling and then stewing.
Egg yolks
Coat the meat and bind the breadcrumbs so they brown and adhere during the fire-browning.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, browned crust over the meat when heated before the fire.
Gravy
Forms the liquid base of the sauce that the meat simmers in, adding moisture and savoury depth.
Flour
Dredged over the meat and mixed with butter to thicken the sauce.
Sherry
Adds acidity and aroma to the sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, mixed with flour to thicken the sauce and brain mixture.

The step that matters

Dredging the meat with flour before simmering. Flour coating the meat and mixing with butter helps thicken the sauce evenly. If the flour is added unevenly or the mixture is not simmered gently, it can clump or leave the sauce thin or lumpy.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, parsley, basil, tarragon, marjoram, thyme, pepper):

  1. Winter savoryfits better
  2. Sagefits better
  3. Rosemaryfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, parsley, basil, tarragon, marjoram, thyme, pepper. 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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