Name: To Stew Pigeons
Ingredients: pigeons; salt pork, cut into 1-inch by ½-inch strips; black pepper; bread, cut into 1-inch by ½-inch pieces; sour apples, cut into bits; flour; coarse sea salt; black pepper; water

Why it works: Pork and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,371 recipes. Both carry 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline, which smells popcorn, roasted. The science ↓

To Stew Pigeons

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pigeons

Prepare the pigeons as you would for roasting.
Roll the salt pork strips in black pepper and place one in each bird's body along with a piece of bread.
Fill the bodies with bits of sour apples.

Stew

Lay the pigeons in a stewpan, breast side down.
Dredge the pigeons with flour and pour in enough water to cover them.
Season with coarse sea salt and black pepper.
Stew over moderate heat for one hour.

Serve

Serve with the sauce around them in a dish.

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.

Pork + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,371 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
Pork + appletop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,581 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
Bread + appletop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,790 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Pork + peppertop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together22,121 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,964 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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 through slow stewing in liquid.
Salt pork: Adds fat and savory flavor that renders into the stew and the birds.
Bread: Soaks up fat and juices inside the birds, adding body and softness to the filling.
Sour apples: Add acidity that brightens the rich meat and balances its fat.
Flour: Dusted on the birds, it helps thicken the cooking liquid into a sauce.