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To Roast Partridges

Roasted partridges served on toasted bread with gravy and bread sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

To Roast Partridges

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the birds

  1. Pick the partridges.

  2. Draw the partridges.

  3. Singe the partridges.

  4. Clean the partridges, leaving the head on.

  5. Make a slit in the neck.

  6. Remove the craw.

  7. Twist the neck around the wing.

  8. Bring the head to the side of the breast.

  9. Truss the legs and wings similarly to fowls, crossing the feet over each other.

Roast and serve

  1. Baste the partridges well with butter.

  2. Roast before a clear fire.

  3. When half done, dust a little flour over them to brown.

  4. Roast for 20 to 30 minutes.

  5. Serve on toasted bread with gravy and bread sauce.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  4. Flour + saucetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,078 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Bread + saucetop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,934 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Partridges
The main meat, cooked whole so the breast and legs roast together.
Butter
Basting fat that keeps the birds moist and promotes golden browning.
Flour
Dusted on partway through roasting to help the surface brown.
Toasted bread
Serves as a base that soaks up the juices and supports the birds.

The step that matters

Dusting with flour when half done. Flour added too early can scorch before the birds finish cooking, while adding it at the halfway point helps the surface brown evenly as the juices reduce.

“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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