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Pigeon Pie

A pie made with pigeon, steak, eggs, livers, and pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,737 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Pigeon Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Cover the bottom of a dish with the sliced rump steak.

  3. Season with salt, pepper, parsley, and shallot.

Make the filling

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped hard-boiled eggs, pigeon livers, shallot, parsley, bread crumbs, and butter.

  2. Fill the pigeons with the mixture and place them in the dish.

  3. Add more seasoned steak on top of the pigeons.

  4. Pour in some water or gravy.

Top and bake

  1. Cover with puff pastry, cut decorative leaves, and lay them on top.

  2. Brush with egg wash and bake until golden.

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. Parsley + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Pepper + shallottop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,898 recipes

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

  5. Shallot + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,245 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

Rump steak
Forms the meaty body of the pie and becomes tender as it cooks.
Hard-boiled eggs
Bind the filling and help it hold together when sliced.
Pigeon livers
Add rich, deep flavour and a soft texture to the filling.
Bread crumbs
Soak up juices and add body, keeping the filling moist.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the filling.
Puff pastry
Bakes into crisp, flaky layers that rise and turn golden brown.

The step that matters

Bake until golden. The dense meat must cook through under the pastry while the crust browns. Check that the meat is cooked and the pastry is evenly golden, since the record gives no bake time.

Swap the shallot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, parsley, egg, liver, bread, butter):

  1. Shallotthe original
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Carrotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, parsley, egg, liver, bread, butter. 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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