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Veal Loaf

A loaf of finely chopped veal mixed with pork, ham, seasonings, soda crackers, eggs, butter, and cream, baked and served cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Veal Loaf

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

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a large bowl, combine the veal, salt pork, ham, salt, pepper, sweet herbs, and lemon juice.

  3. Add the rolled soda crackers, beaten eggs, butter, and cream or milk. Mix thoroughly.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the mixture into a loaf and roll it in crumbs.

  2. Place the loaf in a baking dish and bake for about 2 hours, basting occasionally.

Serve

  1. Serve cold, sliced very thin.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Pork + hamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,638 recipes

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

  5. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Forms the main body of the loaf and gives it its meaty structure.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set as it bakes, holding the loaf together when sliced.
Soda crackers
Absorb liquid and add body, keeping the loaf moist and tender.
Salt pork
Adds fat and richness, keeping the lean meat from drying out.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture so the loaf stays soft rather than dense.

The step that matters

Baking with basting. Veal is very lean, so it dries out easily over a long bake. Basting adds moisture to the surface, and the loaf should be fully set before slicing so it holds its shape.

“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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