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Salmis of Pheasants, a LA Paysanne

A roasted pheasant dish served with a wine and glaze sauce and croutons.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,973 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Salmis of Pheasants, a LA Paysanne

Ingredients

Directions

Roast the birds

  1. Roast the pheasants with croutons of toast placed underneath.

  2. Cut the pheasants into small joints and dish them up immediately.

Make the sauce

  1. In a stewpan, combine shallots, oil, thyme, bay leaf, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Fry the mixture over moderate heat for 5 minutes.

  3. Add white wine, glaze, and consommé; boil until reduced by half.

  4. Stir in lemon juice and serve the sauce over the pheasants with croutons around.

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. Thyme + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

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

  2. Shallot + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

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

  4. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

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

  5. Shallot + lemontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,523 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Pheasants
Provide the main meat, which is roasted and then cut into joints for serving.
Shallots
Soften during frying to build a sweet, savoury base for the sauce.
White wine
Adds acidity and aroma, and reduces with the consommé to concentrate the sauce.
Consommé
Supplies the liquid body of the sauce, which reduces to a concentrated flavour.
Glaze
Adds concentrated meaty flavour and body to the sauce as it reduces.

The step that matters

Boil the sauce until reduced by half. Boiling evaporates water and concentrates the wine, consommé and glaze, so the sauce gains flavour and body. Stopping early leaves it thin and weak, while over-reducing can make it overly salty or sticky.

“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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