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Veal and Ham Pie

A savory pie made with sliced veal, ham, and hard‑boiled eggs, layered with herbs and baked under pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Veal and Ham Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the filling

  1. Cut the veal and ham into neat slices.

  2. In a pie dish, layer the veal, then ham, and then thin slices of hard-boiled egg.

  3. Season each layer with a little coarse sea salt, black pepper, dried herbs, and parsley.

  4. Continue layering until the dish is full.

  5. Pour in about ½ cup of stock or water.

Top and bake

  1. Cover with pastry, decorate the center with pastry leaves, and brush with egg.

  2. Bake in a moderate oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 2 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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Veal + hamtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,264 recipes

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

  3. Ham + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,526 recipes

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

  4. Veal + parsleytop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,766 recipes

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

  5. Veal + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,049 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Forms the main meat layers, becoming tender and moist during the long, slow bake.
Ham
Adds savory, salty flavor that seasons the layers from within.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add richness and a firm, sliceable texture to the layered filling.
Stock or water
Creates moisture that steams the meat and keeps the filling juicy.
Puff or rough puff pastry
Forms a crisp, flaky crust that seals in the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Pouring in the stock or water. The liquid must be added before baking so it can turn to steam and keep the lean veal moist; lean meat dries out easily over a long bake.

“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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