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A Christmas Goose Pie

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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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 ↓

A Christmas Goose Pie

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter with the water, stirring until it boils. Skim off any impurities.

  2. Sift the flour into a bowl, make a hole in the center, and pour in the hot melted butter.

  3. Mix with a spoon to form a stiff paste, then knead on a floured surface until not sticky. Let cool.

  4. Prepare the goose and fowl by splitting them down the back and removing the bones.

  5. Parboil the smoked tongue, peel it, and cut off the root.

  6. Mix nutmeg, mace, pepper, and salt, then season the goose and fowl with this mixture.

  7. Roll out the paste to about 1 inch thick and cut into three pieces: two ovals for the top and bottom, and one long piece for the sides.

  8. Brush the paste with beaten egg white, place the side piece in a pie shape, and pinch the edges together, sealing with egg white.

  9. Ensure the crust can stand alone, then layer in the goose, fowl, and tongue, filling any gaps with additional meat.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Mace + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, egg, pepper):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, egg, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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