Why it works: Lemon and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,445 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Hashed Wild Duck
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Cut the Wild Duck into pieces and place in a stewpan.
Cover with rich gravy and squeeze in the juice of half a lemon.
Add claret, mixed spice, salt, cayenne, and enough breadcrumbs to thicken.
Cook and serve
Heat the pan by the fire until it begins to bubble.
Dish up and garnish with croutons of fried bread before serving.
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.
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Lemon + breadtop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,445 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Wild duck
- Provides the main protein and rich, gamey flavour that the hash is built around.
- Rich gravy
- Supplies moisture and savoury body that surrounds the duck pieces.
- Breadcrumbs
- Absorb liquid and thicken the mixture into a hash-like consistency.
- Claret
- Adds acidity and wine flavour that balances the richness of the duck and gravy.
The step that matters
Heating by the fire until it bubbles. Heating gently until the liquid just bubbles lets the breadcrumbs swell and thicken evenly, while a hard boil can toughen the duck and break the sauce.
“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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