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Calf's Head Hashed

A stew of calf head and feet, seasoned with herbs, onions, and Madeira wine, served with fried brain balls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Calf's Head Hashed

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 ↓

Calf's Head Hashed

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Boil and stew

  1. Boil the calf's head and feet until tender, removing the brains first.

  2. Cut the meat from the head and feet into slices and place in a stew pan with sweet herbs, onions, salt, and pepper.

  3. Add a piece of butter rolled in flour and a little water, then stew slowly until the flavors are extracted.

  4. Remove the meat.

  5. Strain the gravy.

  6. Stir in Madeira wine and grated lemon peel.

Make the brain balls

  1. Clean and wash the brains.

  2. Parboil them.

  3. Make into balls with herbs, bread-crumbs, lemon peel, nutmeg, and beaten egg yolk.

  4. Fry the balls in a mixture of lard and butter.

Bake and serve

  1. Season with cayenne pepper.

  2. Place in a dish.

  3. Pour some over the meat.

  4. Top with a piece of butter.

  5. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until browned.

  6. Serve the meat with the tongue on top, garnished with sliced lemon.

  7. Warm the remaining gravy with a beaten egg yolk stirred in just before serving.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Calf's head
Provides the meat that is cut into slices and braised into the hash.
Butter
Adds richness and, rolled in flour, helps thicken the gravy.
Madeira wine
Adds sweetness and depth of flavor to the gravy.
Egg yolk
Binds the brain balls and thickens the warmed gravy.
Bread-crumbs
Absorbs moisture and gives the brain balls body so they hold their shape.
Brains
Form the soft, rich centre of the fried balls.

The step that matters

Stirring the egg yolk into the warm gravy. Egg yolk thickens when heated gently but curdles if the gravy boils, so it should be added just before serving and kept below boiling.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, butter, flour, madeira wine, lemon, bread, nutmeg):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, flour, madeira wine, lemon, bread, nutmeg. 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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