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Broiled Quail

A whole quail roasted over a slow fire, served on hot toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Quail and butter work together. They rank in the top 16% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 512 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Broiled Quail

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Choose a plump, tender quail.

  2. Draw and split it down the breast bone.

  3. Brush a sheet of parchment paper with melted butter.

  4. Place the quail on the parchment.

  5. Season the quail.

  6. Fold the parchment up, closing the ends.

Cook and serve

  1. Broil the quail over a slow fire for about six minutes on each side.

  2. Serve the quail on a slice of hot toast.

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. Quail + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together512 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Quail + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together391 recipes

    Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).

  3. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Quail
Provides the lean meat that is cooked and served as the main element of the dish.
Melted butter
Adds fat and moisture, helping the quail stay tender and rich while it cooks in the parchment.
Toast
Soaks up juices from the quail and gives the dish a crisp, savoury base.

The step that matters

Broil the quail over a slow fire for about six minutes on each side. Cooking over a slow fire gives heat time to reach the centre of the bird while the parchment keeps moisture in. Too fast or too hot and the outside dries or burns before the meat is cooked through.

“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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