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Buck with Orange-sauce

A roasted duck stuffed with bacon, onion, parsley, salt, pepper, and orange rind.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Buck with Orange-sauce

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 the duck

  1. Pluck and singe the duck, then wipe it with a wet towel and draw it carefully.

  2. Chop the liver finely and mix it with the chopped bacon, onion, parsley, salt, pepper, and orange rind.

  3. Stuff the duck with the mixture.

  4. Truss the duck and tie a large thin slice of bacon over the breast.

Bake

  1. Place the duck in a dripping pan and bake at 400°F (200°C) for 15 to 20 minutes.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Parsley + orangetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together680 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + orangetop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,402 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Duck
Forms the main body of the dish, providing the meat that is cooked and served.
Fat bacon
Adds fat that bastes the meat and flavours the stuffing as it renders.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and savoury depth to the stuffing.
Orange rind
Adds bright aromatic oils that complement the rich duck meat.

The step that matters

Baking the stuffed duck. Duck skin and fat need enough heat to render and crisp, while the meat must cook through without drying. Watching the bird closely keeps the skin crisp and the meat juicy.

Swap the orange

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, parsley, pepper):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Lemonfits better
  3. Avocadofits better
  4. Orangethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, parsley, pepper. 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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