Why it works: Celery and turnip are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,418 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓
Pigeons Roasted
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the pigeons by cleaning them thoroughly.
Make the stuffing by mixing veal, fat of bacon, bread crumbs soaked in milk, and seasoning.
Stuff the pigeons with the veal mixture.
Roast the pigeons until cooked through.
Serve with currant jelly, stewed apples, dressed celery, salad, and mashed turnips or squash.
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.
-
Celery + turniptop 2% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,418 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
-
Bread + milktop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
-
Apple + celerytop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,155 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-vinylphenol (clove, smoky).
-
Milk + appletop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,104 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
-
Currant + appletop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together1,918 recipes
Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
Swap the currant
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, bread, milk, apple, celery, turnip):
- Lemonfits better
- Figfits better
- Pearfits better
- Currantthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against veal, bread, milk, apple, celery, turnip. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
You might also like
The free Flavor Lab newsletter: one surprising pairing a week and the molecular reason it works, in 60 seconds. No spam, unsubscribe anytime.
Prefer an account? Create a free account to save pairings and unlock the full chemistry.
Green Corn Pudding64 recipes
Cornmeal mush12 recipes