Name: Koast Pheasant
Ingredients: 1 pheasant; coarse sea salt; flour; brown gravy; bread sauce

Why it works: Pheasant and flour work together. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 225 recipes. Both carry acetaldehyde, which smells pungent, ethereal. The science ↓

Koast Pheasant

Ingredients

Directions

Hang the pheasant for some time before cooking to enhance flavor.
Pluck and draw the bird, then wipe the inside with a damp cloth.
Truss the pheasant like a partridge, bringing the head under the wing if left on.
Roast the pheasant before a brisk fire, basting it well.
Flour the bird and froth it nicely while roasting.
Serve with brown gravy poured around the bird and a tureen of bread sauce.

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.

Pheasant + flourtop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together225 recipes

Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).
Pheasant + breadtop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together239 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Pheasant + saucetop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together290 recipes

Shared aroma: decanoic acid (soapy, waxy).
Flour + saucetop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together8,078 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Bread + saucetop 22% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together4,934 recipes

Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).