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Pigeons — a LA Venaison

Pigeons cooked in vinegar, butter, salt, and pepper, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,814 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Pigeons — a LA Venaison

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare

  1. Clean the pigeons and remove any feathers.

  2. Soak the pigeons in vinegar for 1 hour.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

Cook and serve

  1. Melt butter in a pan over medium heat.

  2. Brown the pigeons on all sides in the butter.

  3. Cook until the pigeons are tender and fully cooked.

  4. Serve hot.

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. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Vinegar + buttertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

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

What each ingredient does

Pigeons
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender with gentle cooking and browns in butter.
Vinegar
Acidity in the soak that helps tenderise the meat.
Butter
Fat that carries heat for browning and adds richness and flavour to the pigeons.

The step that matters

Cook until the pigeons are tender and fully cooked. Pigeon meat can turn tough if overcooked or dry if rushed. Cooking gently until it is fully cooked and tender keeps it juicy while making sure it is safe to eat.

“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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