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Game Pie

A savory pie made with game birds, sausage meat, truffles, and a buttery crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Game Pie

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.

Prepare the crust

  1. Butter the inside of a raised pie mold carefully.

  2. In a bowl, mix the butter and flour, rubbing the butter into the flour.

  3. Beat the egg.

  4. Mix half the beaten egg with enough water to moisten the paste. Knead the mixture into a firm paste, reserving a piece the size of an apple for the lid.

  5. Roll the larger piece into an oblong shape to line the mold, pressing it neatly inside.

Prepare the filling

  1. Wash the birds. Split the birds lengthwise. Remove all bones from the birds.

  2. Wash the hearts and livers. Chop the hearts and livers.

  3. Mix the hearts and livers with sausage meat and bread crumbs. Add pepper to the mixture. Add salt to the mixture. Combine the mixture thoroughly.

Assemble and bake

  1. Layer a little of the mixture in the bottom of the mold. Place half a bird on the mixture. Season the bird. Add sausage meat. Add truffles. Add tongue. Repeat layers until all ingredients are used. Fill spaces with sausage meat.

  2. Wet the edges with water. Place the lid on. Make an opening in the top. Decorate the top. Brush with egg.

  3. Bake in the oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 1.5 hours.

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. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter 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

Flour
Forms the paste structure that holds the pie crust together while baking.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness to the crust and fat for flavor in the filling.
Egg
Binds the crust paste and glazes the top for a golden color.
Sausage meat
Adds fat and moisture to the filling, keeping the meat tender as it bakes.
Bread crumbs
Absorbs juices and helps bind the chopped hearts, livers and sausage meat together.
Birds
Provide the main meat of the pie, cooking through in the enclosed crust.

The step that matters

Bake in the oven at 350°F (175°C) for about 1.5 hours.. A raised pie holds dense, layered meat that must reach a safe internal temperature throughout. Because the filling is thick and enclosed, the center cooks slowly, so check that the meat is fully cooked before serving.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Nutmegthe original
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Thymefits less well

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

“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.

More game pie recipes

English 13Christmas 6Forcemeat 4Raised 4Venison and Hare 4French 3 See all 39 →

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