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Farce Fine d'Ecrivisses —

A forcemeat made from crayfish, butter, panade, eggs, seasoning, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Crayfish and meat work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81 recipes. Both carry 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine, which smells cocoa, roasted. The science ↓

Farce Fine d'Ecrivisses —

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the crayfish

  1. Boil the crayfish and make crayfish butter from the shells.

  2. Pound the flesh from the claws and rub it through a wire sieve.

Make the forcemeat

  1. Weigh 10 ounces of the meat and beat it with 10 ounces of panade.

  2. Add 2 ounces of fresh butter, 4 ounces of crayfish butter, seasoning spice, nutmeg, and 3 yolks of eggs.

  3. Pound the mixture until well combined.

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. Crayfish + meattop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3,5-trimethylpyrazine (cocoa, roasted).

  2. Crayfish + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together343 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  3. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Crayfish meat
Provides the main flavour and the body of the forcemeat.
Panade
Adds bulk and moisture, keeping the forcemeat light and tender.
Egg yolks
Bind the mixture and help it set smoothly when cooked.
Fresh butter
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture.
Crayfish butter
Carries concentrated crayfish flavour and colour through the mixture.

The step that matters

Pound the mixture until well combined. Thorough pounding evenly distributes the fat, egg and panade so the forcemeat becomes smooth and cohesive. Uneven mixing can leave greasy or crumbly patches once cooked.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (crayfish, butter, meat, egg):

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Capersfits about as well
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against crayfish, butter, meat, egg. 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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