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Cutlets of Quails, a LA Bordelaise

Quail cutlets served with truffles, mushrooms, and Bordelaise sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Truffle and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,900 recipes. Both carry 2,4-nonadienal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Cutlets of Quails, a LA Bordelaise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Trim the quails into cutlets.

  2. Season the cutlets with pepper and coarse sea salt.

Cook the cutlets

  1. Heat a little clarified butter in a sauté pan over high heat.

  2. Fry the cutlets until lightly browned on both sides.

  3. Pour off the grease, add the glaze, and toss the cutlets in it over the heat.

Plate and serve

  1. Arrange the cutlets in a circle with the legs facing up.

  2. Fill the center with scallops of truffles and mushrooms.

  3. Pour Bordelaise sauce over the cutlets and serve.

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. Truffle + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,900 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Butter + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Butter and sauce barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Quails
Provide the meat that is cut into cutlets and cooked as the main component.
Clarified butter
Conducts high heat for frying and browns the cutlets without burning as readily as whole butter.
Glaze
Coats the cutlets with concentrated savory flavor and a glossy finish.
Truffles
Add a deep, earthy aroma to the dish.
Mushrooms
Add savory umami flavor and a tender, moist texture to the centre garnish.

The step that matters

Frying the cutlets until lightly browned. Searing over high heat in a hot pan drives the Maillard reaction, which builds browned flavor on the surface. If the pan is not hot enough or is crowded, the cutlets steam and turn pale and grey instead of browning.

“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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