Name: Prairie Chickens, Partridges and Quails
Ingredients: Prairie chickens, partridges, or quails; Soda (for washing); Dressing (your choice); Butter (for basting); Fried or toasted bread (for garnish); Lemon (for garnish); Parsley (for garnish); Currant jelly (for garnish)

Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Prairie Chickens, Partridges and Quails

Ingredients

Directions

Clean the birds using a little soda in the washing water, then rinse and dry them.
Fill the birds with dressing, sew them up, and bind the legs and wings with cords.
Place the birds in a steamer over hot water and cook until just done.
Transfer the birds to a pan with a little butter and place in the oven.
Baste frequently with melted butter until they are nicely browned, about 15 minutes.
Serve on a platter garnished with sprigs of parsley and currant jelly.

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.

Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,037 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Chicken + breadtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,258 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity).
Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together28,563 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).
Bread + parsleytop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,588 recipes

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

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

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, butter, bread, lemon, parsley):

Limefits better
Avocadofits better
Orangefits better
Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, butter, bread, lemon, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.