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To Hash a Duck

A stew of duck pieces cooked with ham or bacon, wine, and peas.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and peas are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,331 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Hash a Duck

Ingredients

Directions

Braise the duck

  1. Season the duck pieces with pepper and mixed spices.

  2. Layer thin slices of ham or bacon in a stew pan.

  3. Add the duck on top and cover it with more ham.

  4. Add just enough water to moisten the duck.

  5. Pour a large glass of red wine over the mixture.

  6. Cover the pan tightly and let it stew for 1 hour.

Serve

  1. Prepare the green peas by mixing them with butter and pepper.

  2. Serve the peas around the hashed duck.

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. Pepper + peastop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,331 recipes

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

  2. Red wine + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,599 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Pepper + red winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,075 recipes

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

  4. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  5. Peas + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,887 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Duck
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and rich as it stews slowly.
Red wine
Adds acidity and depth of flavour to the stewing liquid.
Ham or bacon
Adds salty, savoury fat that flavours the duck as it cooks.
Green peas
Provide a bright, sweet contrast to the rich, savoury duck.

The step that matters

Cover the pan tightly and let it stew for 1 hour. Gentle, covered stewing keeps moisture in the pan so the tough connective tissue in the duck breaks down slowly. Lifting the lid or boiling hard dries and toughens the meat.

Swap the peas

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, ham, red wine, butter):

  1. Peasthe original
  2. Beansfits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits less well
  4. Walnutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, ham, red wine, butter. 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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