Name: Roast Prairie Chickens or Grouse
Ingredients: Prairie chickens or grouse; Butter; Lemon juice; Coarse sea salt; Black pepper; Fat salt pork; Currant jelly; Bread sauce

Why it works: Chicken and pork match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,417 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓

Roast Prairie Chickens or Grouse

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Clean and wipe the birds. If tough, truss them and steam over hard-boiling water for 30 minutes.
While hot, rub the birds inside and out with butter, lemon juice, coarse sea salt, and black pepper.
Place a small piece of fat salt pork inside each bird.
Roast covered in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 30 minutes.
Baste three times with a mixture of butter and hot water, then with butter alone just before serving.
Serve with currant jelly and bread sauce.

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.

Chicken + porktop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,417 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together27,047 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,232 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Pork + breadtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together4,371 recipes

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

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,933 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, butter, lemon, pepper, pork, bread, sauce):

Avocadofits better
Limefits better
Coconutfits better
Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, butter, lemon, pepper, pork, bread, sauce. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.