Skip to main content
Main

Aspic Jelly

Aspic jelly is a clear gelatin-based savory jelly made with lemon, bay leaves, tarragon vinegar, onion, celery, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lemon and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,137 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Aspic Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Make the clarified liquid

  1. In a clean pan, combine the water and gelatine with all other ingredients except the egg whites.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Whisk the egg whites until frothy and add them to the boiling liquid.

  4. Boil for 3 minutes, then remove from heat and let it stand until clear.

Strain

  1. Strain through a jelly bag or clean cloth.

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. Lemon + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,137 recipes

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

  2. Tarragon + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together456 recipes

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

  3. Lemon + celerytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

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

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Tarragon + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Gelatine
Sets the liquid into a firm, wobbly aspic when it cools.
Whites of 2 eggs
Bind to cloudy particles as they cook, collecting them so the liquid can be clarified.
Lemon
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour of the clear liquid.
White vinegar
Adds acidity that helps the egg whites coagulate and clarify the liquid.

The step that matters

Boil for 3 minutes, then let it stand until clear. Egg whites must be added to the liquid before it boils, then it is briefly boiled so the whites coagulate and trap cloudiness. Boiling too long or stirring vigorously can break up the raft and leave the aspic cloudy.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lemon, tarragon, vinegar, onion, egg, celery):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Dillfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against lemon, tarragon, vinegar, onion, egg, celery. 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.

More aspic recipes

Chicken 77Meat 26Tomato 25Jelly 16Lobster 14Beef 10 See all 167 →

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesCream of Celery SoupCream of Celery Soup113 recipesCelery StewCelery Stew25 recipesCelery CroquettesCelery Croquettes16 recipes