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Pigeons in Jelly

A dish of pigeons preserved in a clear jelly made from broth and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Pigeons in Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth and stuffing

  1. Prepare the stuffing by mixing hard-boiled egg yolks, marrow, sweet herbs, pepper, salt, and mace.

  2. Boil the knuckle of veal (or calf's foot) to make broth.

  3. In a pan, combine the broth with a blade of mace, sweet herbs, white pepper, lemon peel, and bacon.

Cook the pigeons

  1. Add the pigeons to the pan.

  2. Bake the pigeons until cooked through.

  3. Let the pigeons cool in the broth.

  4. Remove the pigeons from the broth.

  5. Cover the pigeons to preserve color.

Make the jelly and set

  1. Boil the jelly with the whites of two eggs.

  2. Strain the mixture through a cloth.

  3. Remove the fat from the jelly.

  4. Place the pigeons upside down in a bowl.

  5. Pour the jelly over the pigeons, ensuring it covers the feet.

  6. Refrigerate for at least 24 hours before serving.

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

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

  2. Mace + white peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,695 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

  3. Lemon + myrtletop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together39 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  5. White pepper + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,658 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 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

Pigeons
Form the main body of the dish, cooked through and served whole in jelly.
Hard-boiled egg yolks
Form a rich, crumbly stuffing that adds body and fat to the filling.
Marrow
Adds richness and fat, keeping the stuffing moist and savoury.
Knuckle of veal
Releases gelatin into the broth, which is what allows the jelly to set.
Egg whites
Clarify the jelly as they are boiled and strained, leaving it clear.

The step that matters

Removing the fat from the jelly. Fat left on the surface of the strained jelly can stop it setting clear and firm, and it can make the finished dish greasy. Chilling the jelly lets fat rise so it can be skimmed off.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, pepper, mace, veal, lemon, myrtle):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, mace, veal, lemon, myrtle. 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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