Name: Pluviers Ou Vanneaux Rôtis
Ingredients: pluviers ou vanneaux (as needed); coarse sea salt (to taste); black pepper (to taste); butter (for basting); slices of bread (for serving)

Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Pluviers Ou Vanneaux Rôtis

Ingredients

pluviers ou vanneaux (as needed)
coarse sea salt (to taste)
black pepper (to taste)
butter (for basting)
slices of bread (for serving)

Directions

Pluck and prepare the pluviers or vanneaux without gutting them.
Bard the birds with bacon or fat.
Skewer the birds on a spit and roast them over a fire.
Place slices of bread underneath to catch the drippings.
Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper while roasting.

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.

Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together85,593 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).