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Excellent Meat Bolls

Meatballs made from forcemeat, wrapped in puff pastry and baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and veal are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,381 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

Excellent Meat Bolls

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately quick oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Make forcemeat according to the specified recipe.

  2. Form the forcemeat into small rolls, no larger than a finger.

Wrap and bake

  1. Wrap each roll with pounded meat, moistening it with 1 teaspoon of water.

  2. Fold the rolls in puff pastry and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 15-20 minutes, until the crust is golden.

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 + vealtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,381 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Puff pastry
Forms a flaky, golden crust that encloses the filling and browns in the oven.
Half-roasted veal, chicken, or turkey
Provides the meat that is pounded and wrapped around the forcemeat rolls.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the forcemeat for a tender texture and savory flavor.

The step that matters

Wrap each roll with pounded meat, moistening it with 1 teaspoon of water. Enough moisture helps the wrapping adhere and keeps the meat from drying out in the oven, while the pastry seals the rolls.

“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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