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Pheasant Ok Chicken Soup

A soup of pheasant meatballs simmered in beef broth.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Pheasant Ok Chicken Soup

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pheasant

  1. Partially roast the pheasants until browned, then let them cool.

  2. Remove the flesh from the breasts and set aside, covering it to keep it fresh.

  3. Cut the remaining parts of the pheasants into joints and bruise the bodies.

  4. Stew the pheasants in the beef broth for 2-3 hours, then strain the soup.

  5. Cool the soup and remove the skin from the breast meat.

Make the meatballs

  1. Mince the breast meat and pound it with the butter and bread crumbs until smooth.

  2. Season the mixture with cayenne, salt, mace, nutmeg, and minced shallots.

  3. Moisten the mixture with egg yolks and roll into small balls.

Finish the soup

  1. Skim the fat from the soup and heat it in a clean pot until boiling.

  2. Poach the balls in the boiling soup for 10-12 minutes, ensuring the soup is well-seasoned.

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. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Nutmeg + shallottop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  4. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Pheasant + beeftop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together131 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Pheasants
Provide the main meat for both the broth and the meatball mixture.
Beef broth
Forms the liquid base of the soup, carrying flavor from the stewed pheasant.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, tender texture to the meatball mixture.
Bread crumbs
Absorbs moisture and helps bind the meatball mixture so it holds its shape.
Egg yolks
Bind the mixture and add richness, helping the balls hold together while poaching.
Shallots
Add a mild, aromatic onion flavor to the meatball seasoning.

The step that matters

Poaching the meatballs. Keep the soup at a gentle boil rather than a hard one so the delicate balls cook through without breaking apart or becoming tough. Egg yolk and crumbs bind the mixture, but rough agitation can still crack it.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pheasant, beef, butter, bread, pepper, nutmeg, shallot):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pheasant, beef, butter, bread, pepper, nutmeg, shallot. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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