Name: To Roast Partridges
Ingredients: Partridges; slices of lemon; bacon; paper for covering; clear juice; allspice; Seville orange juice

Why it works: Lemon and orange match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,634 recipes. Both carry 3-hexenal, which smells apple, fruity. The science ↓

To Roast Partridges

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).
Cover the breasts of the partridges with slices of lemon and then with bacon.
Tightly cover with paper.
Roast until ready, then remove the paper and froth the partridges.
Serve with clear juice, allspice, and a little Seville orange juice.

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.

Lemon + orangetop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together10,634 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Allspice + orangetop 4% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together727 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Lemon + allspicetop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,083 recipes

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