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Spiced Meat

A spiced meat loaf made with veal or beef, pork, crackers, pepper, salt, butter, eggs, and sweet cream, baked until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Spiced Meat

Oven, in the book's wordsA very slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a very slow oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the meat

  1. Chop the veal and pork together very fine.

Mix and shape

  1. Add the rolled crackers, pepper, salt, butter, eggs, and sweet cream to the meat mixture. Mix all ingredients thoroughly.

  2. Pack the mixture firmly into bread tins.

Bake

  1. Bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for two hours.

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

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

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

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

  3. Butter + porktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

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

  4. Pork + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,093 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + porktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal or beef
Provides the main meaty body and richness of the loaf.
Pork
Adds fat, which keeps the loaf moist and tender as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm when baked.
Rolled crackers
Absorb juices and help hold the loaf together while keeping it tender.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, contributing moisture and flavor to the loaf.
Sweet cream
Adds moisture and softness to the mixture.

The step that matters

Mix all ingredients thoroughly. Even mixing spreads the eggs and fat evenly through the meat, so the binding and moisture are consistent throughout the loaf rather than patchy or crumbly in some slices.

“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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