Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Pheasant or Prairie Chicken Broiled
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Scald the bird.
Skin the bird.
Cut off the breast.
Cut the rest into joints, removing all shot.
Parboil the joints until they can be pierced with a fork.
Remove the joints.
Season and cook
Rub the joints and breast with salt, pepper, and butter.
Broil the breast over a brisk fire.
Place a lump of butter on each piece.
Set in a 400°F (200°C) oven for a few minutes.
Serve at breakfast on fried mush, or at dinner on toast with a bit of currant jelly over each piece.
Make the sauce
Rub butter and flour together.
Add the water used in cooking the bird.
Pour the sauce over the toast.
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.
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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Pheasant + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together225 recipes
Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).
-
Butter + curranttop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together7,856 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
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Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together50,459 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Pheasant + peppertop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together462 recipes
Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Pheasant
- Lean meat that is parboiled first so it becomes tender before broiling.
- Butter
- Adds fat and moisture to the meat and browns it during broiling and baking.
- Flour
- Mixed with butter to thicken the sauce made from the cooking water.
- Currant jelly
- Adds sweetness and a tart fruity note that balances the rich meat.
The step that matters
Parboil the joints until they can be pierced with a fork. Parboiling softens the connective tissue of lean game birds so the meat becomes tender. Cooking it only until pierceable, not fully through, leaves it moist for the final broiling and oven stage.
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pheasant, pepper, butter, flour):
- Lemonfits better
- Raisinfits better
- Limefits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against pheasant, pepper, butter, flour. 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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