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Hot Snipe Pie, with Truffles

A savory pie made from cooked snipes, truffles, bacon, and herbs, baked in a crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Hot Snipe Pie, with Truffles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the snipes

  1. Pick the snipes.

  2. Singe the snipes.

  3. Remove their necks and feet.

  4. Cut them in half.

  5. Remove the backbone.

  6. Wipe the inside with a napkin.

Cook the filling

  1. Place the snipes in a sauté pan with melted butter, grated bacon, parsley, mushrooms, truffles, shallot, salt, and nutmeg.

  2. Simmer on moderate heat for 20 minutes.

  3. Turn occasionally to ensure even seasoning.

  4. Let the mixture cool.

Assemble the pie

  1. Chop the snipes.

  2. Pound them in a mortar.

  3. Add godiveau, sweet herbs, and nutmeg to the pounded mixture.

  4. Make a crust 7 inches in diameter and 4 inches high to hold the filling.

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. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  4. Mushroom + shallottop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,982 recipes

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

  5. Mushroom + truffletop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,900 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Snipes
Form the main meat of the filling, providing the bulk and flavor of the pie.
Melted butter
Adds richness and moisture, carrying flavor through the filling as it cooks.
Grated bacon
Contributes salty, savory fat that seasons the snipes during simmering.
Truffles
Provide a concentrated earthy aroma that defines the dish.
Godiveau
Adds a finely textured forcemeat that binds and softens the pounded filling.

The step that matters

Simmer on moderate heat for 20 minutes. Gentle, moderate heat cooks the birds through without toughening their proteins or drying the fat out, while turning the occasional stirring keeps seasoning even. Too hot a pan can scorch the butter and bacon and make the mixture bitter.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, parsley, mushroom, truffle, shallot, nutmeg, meat):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, parsley, mushroom, truffle, shallot, nutmeg, meat. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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