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Jugged Pigeon

A pigeon stuffed with suet, breadcrumbs, herbs, and eggs, sealed in a jar and simmered, served with a sauce of cream, lemon, anchovy, and mushrooms.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and marjoram match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,979 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Jugged Pigeon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stuffing

  1. Mix the shredded beef suet, bread crumbs, parsley, marjoram, and eggs in a bowl.

  2. Stuff the mixture into the pigeon and sew it up.

Cook in a jar

  1. Place the stuffed pigeon in a jar with the butter and seal it tightly.

  2. Set the jar in a pot of water and simmer for 2 hours, ensuring it boils continuously.

Make the sauce and serve

  1. Once cooked, remove the pigeon from the jar and skim the fat from the gravy.

  2. Add cream, lemon peel, anchovy, mushrooms, and thicken the sauce with flour and butter.

  3. Serve the pigeon on a plate, pour the sauce over it, and garnish with sliced lemon.

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 + marjoramtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,979 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Marjoram + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together957 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

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

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the stuffing so it holds together during cooking.
Bread crumbs
Absorb juices and give the stuffing body and a soft texture.
Beef suet
Adds fat that keeps the stuffing and bird moist and flavorful.
Butter
Provides fat for richness and, with flour, thickens the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the sauce when cooked with butter.
Cream
Adds richness and smoothness to the sauce.

The step that matters

Keep the water boiling continuously during the 2-hour simmer. The jar relies on steady, sustained heat from the surrounding water to cook the bird through gently. If the water stops boiling, the temperature inside drops and the pigeon may cook unevenly or not fully.

Swap the marjoram

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, bread, parsley, egg, butter, cream, lemon):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Tarragonfits about as well
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Marjoramthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, bread, parsley, egg, butter, cream, lemon. 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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