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Game Sauce

A sauce made from bread, salt, nutmeg, claret, orange juice, butter, flour, celery, cream, mace, and nutmeg for game birds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and mace 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 ↓

Game Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the sauce

  1. Grate the bread and combine it with salt, nutmeg, claret, and orange juice.

  2. Boil the celery until tender.

  3. Add cream, butter rolled in flour, mace, and nutmeg to the celery.

Finish the game

  1. When the fowl is half roasted, melt the butter with the flour over low heat, stirring constantly.

  2. Pour the mixture over the fowl with the gravy from the pan.

  3. Serve the celery sauce alongside the game.

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. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,331 recipes

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

  4. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  5. Nutmeg + orangetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,746 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Bread
Grated bread thickens the sauce and gives it body.
Butter
Melted butter with flour forms a roux that adds richness and smooth texture.
Flour
Cooked with butter, it thickens the sauce and helps it hold together.
Cream
Adds richness and a smooth, mellow texture to the celery sauce.
Claret
Adds acidity and wine flavour that balances the richness of the sauce.
Orange juice
Adds acidity and bright citrus flavour to the sauce.

The step that matters

Melting the butter with flour over low heat. Stirring constantly over low heat keeps the flour and butter smooth; high heat or no stirring can scorch the roux or leave lumps in the thickened sauce.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (bread, nutmeg, orange, butter, flour, celery, cream):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, nutmeg, orange, butter, flour, celery, cream. 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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