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Raised Ham Pie

A baked ham pie with veal forcemeat and a sauce made from the cooking liquid.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Raised Ham Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the ham

  1. Soak the ham for 4–5 hours, then wash and scrape it well.

  2. Cut off the knuckle and boil it for 30 minutes.

  3. Trim the ham neatly, remove the rind, and place it in an oval stew pan.

  4. Add the Madeira or Sherry and enough veal stock to cover the ham.

  5. Let it stew for 2 hours or until three‑quarters cooked, then cool it.

Assemble and bake

  1. Prepare a crust large enough to hold the ham and veal forcemeat.

  2. Place the ham in the crust, surround it with veal forcemeat, and cover it.

  3. Bake in a slow oven at 300°F (150°C) for about 1.5 hours.

Glaze and serve

  1. Remove the cover, glaze the top, and serve with sauce made from the cooking liquid.

  2. Make the sauce: skim fat from the cooking liquid, thicken with flour and butter, and add browning sauce and cayenne pepper.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sherry + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Ham + sherrytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together377 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

  4. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Ham + vealtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,264 recipes

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

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Ham
Is the main component, cooked gently in stock and wine until tender.
Madeira or sherry
Adds aromatic depth and sweetness to the cooking liquid and sauce.
Veal stock
Provides savoury body and moisture for stewing the ham and forming the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a smooth, pourable sauce.
Butter
Enriches the sauce and adds fat for smooth texture and flavour.

The step that matters

Stewing the ham until three-quarters cooked. Stopping at three-quarters cooked leaves the ham to finish in the oven without drying out. Overcooking it now makes the meat stringy and dry after baking.

“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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