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Broiled Grouse

A whole grouse seasoned with salt and pepper, baked and broiled, finished with melted butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Broiled Grouse

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Split the grouse down the back and lard the breast.

  2. Season inside and out with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

Cook

  1. Place in a pan and cover with another inverted pan.

  2. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 20 minutes.

  3. Transfer to a broiler and brown.

  4. Melt a good-sized piece of butter in the pan and pour over the bird.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

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

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Grouse
Is the main protein, cooked whole and split so it cooks evenly.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and helps the skin brown and the meat stay moist.
Flour
Not used in any step of the record, so its role is not stated.

The step that matters

Transfer to a broiler and brown. Browning needs direct high heat for a short time after the gentle oven stage. Watch closely, because the skin and fat can scorch quickly while the inside is still 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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