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Quails, a LA Royale

A dish of boned quails stuffed with force-meat, braised in broth, coated in breadcrumbs, and fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Quails, a LA Royale

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the quails

  1. Stuff the boned quails with quenelle force-meat.

  2. Truss the stuffed quails.

  3. Place the quails, sliced carrot, onion, cloves, and parsley, in a stewpan.

  4. Moisten the quails with white broth.

  5. Cover the quails with buttered paper.

  6. Braise gently for 45 minutes.

  7. Allow the quails to cool in their own liquor.

  8. Remove the quails and place them on a dish to cool completely.

  9. Remove the strings from the quails.

Coat and fry

  1. Coat the quails with d’Uxelles sauce.

  2. Cool the coated quails until set.

  3. Roll the quails in bread crumbs.

  4. Dip the rolled quails in beaten egg.

  5. Coat the quails again with bread crumbs.

  6. Fry the quails in hot hog’s-lard until light brown.

  7. Drain the fried quails.

Serve

  1. Serve the quails on a border of quenelle force-meat.

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. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  2. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  4. Clove + parsleytop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  5. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Quails
Provide the main meat, which is stuffed, braised and then fried in a crumb coating.
Quenelle force-meat
Fills the birds and forms the border under them, giving a soft, delicate texture.
D’uxelles sauce
Coats the quails, adding a rich, savoury layer that helps the crumbs adhere.
Beaten egg
Binds the bread crumbs to the quails so the outer coating holds during frying.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden outer crust when the quails are fried.

The step that matters

Cool the coated quails until set. If the d’Uxelles coating is not chilled until firm, it will soften and slide off, so the egg and crumbs will not stick and the crust will fail in the hot fat.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (quail, meat, carrot, onion, parsley, sauce, bread):

  1. Celeryfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against quail, meat, carrot, onion, parsley, sauce, bread. 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.

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