Skip to main content
Main

Bewitched Veal

A baked loaf of finely chopped veal mixed with eggs, milk, butter, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Bewitched Veal

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the meat

  1. Chop the veal, salt pork, onion, and nutmeg very finely.

Mix and shape

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped meat with the eggs and milk.

  2. Add the butter, salt, and cayenne, and mix well.

  3. Form the mixture into a compact loaf and sprinkle with bread crumbs.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 1 to 2 hours, covering while baking.

  2. Serve cold with salad.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Onion + porktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,214 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Veal + porktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,930 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the meat together so the loaf holds its shape when sliced.
Veal
Provides the main body of the loaf, with mild flavour and a fine, tender texture.
Fat salt pork
Adds fat that keeps the lean meat moist during baking.
Milk
Adds moisture that keeps the loaf tender rather than dry.
Butter
Adds richness and fat for moisture and flavour.

The step that matters

Covering while baking. Lean meat dries out in a long oven bake. Covering the loaf traps steam and moisture, so it stays tender over the 1 to 2 hours in the oven.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, veal, nutmeg, pork, butter, milk, bread):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, veal, nutmeg, pork, butter, milk, bread. 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 veal loaf recipes

Spiced 11Creole 3 See all 380 →

You might also like

Brown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesPork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipesWhite BreadWhite Bread80 recipes