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Gateau De l'Aevrey T. E. Hare Cake for the Second Course

A savory hare forcemeat cake baked slowly with lard, pistachios, truffles, and bacon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Gateau De l'Aevrey T. E. Hare Cake for the Second Course

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the forcemeat

  1. Prepare the hare and save the liver and blood.

  2. Scrape the meat from the skin and sinews, then mince it with the liver, calf's liver, and ham.

  3. Pound the mixture with a little cold stock or hare/game soup.

  4. Add ⅓ of the total mixture in rasped lard, then pound again with salt, pepper, blanched onions, and parsley.

  5. Season with 1 tablespoon of brandy and mix in 6-8 eggs one at a time, adding garlic juice if desired.

Layer and bake

  1. Line a stew‑pan with slices of lard and spread the forcemeat to a thickness of 1.5 inches, smoothing it out.

  2. Layer lard, pistachios, and truffles on top in a mosaic pattern, then cover with another layer of forcemeat.

  3. Top with slices of bacon and cover with paper.

  4. Close the pan and bake slowly for 2‑3 hours, depending on the number of layers.

Serve

  1. Let it cool, dip the mold in hot water to loosen, and turn it out onto a napkin.

  2. Garnish as desired.

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 + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Meat + hamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,095 recipes

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

  5. Liver + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,420 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the forcemeat and help it set firm when baked.
Hare meat
Provides the main body and savoury flavour of the forcemeat.
Lard
Adds fat and moisture, keeping the forcemeat tender as it cooks.
Liver
Adds richness and depth of flavour, and a smooth, binding texture when minced.
Ham
Adds savoury, salty flavour and a meaty bite to the forcemeat.

The step that matters

Slow baking of the layered forcemeat. Eggs and meat proteins set as they heat. Too high a heat or too fast a bake can make the forcemeat dry, cracked, or uneven, so it bakes slowly to set evenly through all layers.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (liver, meat, ham, pepper, parsley, brandy, egg):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Carrotfits better
  3. Mustardfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against liver, meat, ham, pepper, parsley, brandy, 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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