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Cold Ham-pie

A cold ham pie made with smoked ham, lard, pork, veal, bacon, truffles, and short pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Veal and truffle work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 815 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Cold Ham-pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the ham and truffles

  1. Soak the ham in milk and water if it is over-salted, then cut it into squares about 2 inches each.

  2. Stud each square with a piece of raw truffle.

  3. Melt the lard in a stewpan, then fry the ham squares for a few minutes.

Make the mince

  1. Prepare a mince with equal parts lean pork and veal, and the same amount of fresh fat bacon.

  2. Chop and mix the truffle trimmings with the mince, then add finely chopped cooked ham and small diced cooked fat bacon.

  3. Season the mixture lightly with salt.

Assemble and bake

  1. Line a cold pie mold with short pastry, covering the bottom and sides.

  2. Fill the mold with a layer of the mince, then add the ham squares alternated with the force-meat.

  3. Shape the filling into a dome, cover with layers of fat bacon, and then with pastry.

  4. Egg wash the top and bake in a moderate oven (350°F/175°C) for 2 hours, covering with thick paper when it starts to brown.

  5. After 1 hour of cooling, fill the pie through the chimney with 2 glasses of liquid.

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. Veal + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together815 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  2. Pork + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,380 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethylphenol (must).

  3. Pork + vealtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,930 recipes

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

  4. Ham + truffletop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together516 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Ham + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,638 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Smoked ham
Provides the savory, cured flavor that is the core of the pie.
Lean pork and veal
Form the bulk of the mince, giving the filling body and a firm, sliceable texture.
Fresh fat bacon
Adds fat that keeps the mince moist and rich as it cooks.
Lard
Fat for frying the ham, adding richness and browning to its surface.
Raw truffles
Contribute a strong, earthy aroma that perfumes the filling.
Short pastry
Forms a sturdy, crisp shell that holds the filling in its mold.

The step that matters

Covering the top with thick paper when it starts to brown. The top is exposed to the oven's heat for a long bake; covering it slows browning so the crust does not darken or dry out before the filling is fully cooked through.

“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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