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Partridges

A roasted partridge served with bacon‑covered bread, truffle slices, and a game‑broth velouté puree over rice.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter 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 ↓

Partridges

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the bread

  1. Cut the block of bread and place a thin slice of fatty bacon on top.

  2. Arrange the fillets and truffle slices on the bread, then cover with another slice of bacon.

Cook the partridges

  1. Roast the partridges until cooked, then let them cool.

  2. Remove the skin and fat, chop the meat, and pound it in a mortar, adding game broth and velouté sauce gradually.

  3. Pass the puree through a fine sieve and keep it warm in a bain‑marie.

Bake and serve

  1. In a sauté pan, place the bread with fillets and bake until done.

  2. Boil the plover eggs.

  3. Prepare a rice croustade on a dish, pour in half of the puree, and arrange the fillets and eggs on top.

  4. Pour the remaining puree in the center, arrange the small fillets on top pointing to the center, and place a truffle in the middle.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Truffle + buttertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,209 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  3. Bread + ricetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sauce + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together15,338 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

Sauce and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,338 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

Partridges
Provide the main cooked meat that is chopped and pounded into the puree.
Game broth
Adds moisture and loosens the pounded meat into a smooth puree.
Veloute sauce
Adds body and richness, helping the puree hold together and feel smooth.
Fat bacon
Adds fat that bastes the bread and fillets, keeping them moist during baking.
Truffles
Contribute a strong earthy aroma that perfumes the dish.
Plovers' eggs
Add delicate richness and a creamy texture as a garnish.

The step that matters

Pass the puree through a fine sieve. Pounded meat can stay coarse and fibrous; sieving removes the remaining strands and gives the smooth, even texture the puree needs. Keeping it warm in a bain-marie stops it from thickening or separating before serving.

“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 partridges recipes

Roasted 57with Cabbage 29Roast 23Broiled 21Boiled 18Stuffed 17

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