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Partridge Pie

A savory pie of partridges baked in puff pastry with stock, butter, and herbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 ↓

Partridge Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Line a deep baking dish with veal cutlets.

  2. Layer slices of ham and season with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Pluck, draw, wipe, and quarter the partridges.

  4. Rub each piece with pepper, coarse sea salt, minced parsley, and butter.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the partridge pieces in the baking dish and pour over the strong soup stock.

  2. Line the edges of the dish with puff pastry and cover the top with more pastry.

  3. Brush the top with egg yolk and bake at 400°F (200°C) for one hour.

  4. If the pastry browns too quickly, cover it with thick paper.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

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

  4. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Partridges
Provide the main meat, which cooks through in the enclosed dish.
Veal cutlets
Line the dish, adding savoury meat that enriches the filling and juices.
Puff pastry
Forms a crisp, flaky crust that seals in the filling while baking.
Strong soup stock
Adds moisture and savoury depth, forming the sauce as the pie cooks.
Egg yolk
Brushed on top to promote even browning and a glossy finish.
Butter
Adds richness and fat that carries flavour and helps the meat stay moist.

The step that matters

Watching the pastry colour. Puff pastry browns quickly at high oven heat while the filling needs the full hour to cook through. Covering the top with thick paper when it darkens too fast prevents burning without stopping the interior from cooking.

“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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