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Pigeons in Jelly

A dish of pigeons cooked in a clarified calf's foot jelly with herbs, mace, bacon, and lemon peel.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and white pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,695 recipes. Both carry myrcene, which smells balsamic, herbaceous. The science ↓

Pigeons in Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Braise the pigeons

  1. Combine the jelly or stock with sweet herbs, mace, white pepper, bacon, and lemon peel in a stewpan.

  2. Add the trussed pigeons to the stewpan. Season to taste.

  3. Bake until done.

  4. Remove the pigeons and keep them covered to preserve their color.

Clarify the jelly

  1. Remove the fat from the liquid.

  2. Boil the egg whites with the jelly to clarify it.

  3. Strain the jelly through a cloth dipped in boiling water.

  4. Pour the clarified jelly over and around the pigeons.

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

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Veal + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together4,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Veal + macetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,761 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  5. Mace + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,315 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg whites
Coagulate as they boil, trapping particles so the jelly clears when strained.
Calf's foot jelly
Forms the setting liquid that gives the dish its jellied body once chilled.
Pigeons
Provide the main meat, which cooks gently in the seasoned jelly.
Lean bacon
Adds savory flavor to the cooking liquid without much fat.

The step that matters

Keep the pigeons covered after removing them. Covering them while they rest and cool helps preserve their color, since exposure to air can dull the meat's appearance.

Swap the mace

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

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. Macethe original

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