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Duchesses Au Caviar

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pistachio and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 100 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Duchesses Au Caviar

Oven, in the book's wordsA sharp oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a sharp oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

  1. Prepare unsweetened choux-paste and place it in a piping bag with a plain tip.

  2. Pipe small heaps of paste onto a greased baking sheet.

  3. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven until light brown.

  4. Make an incision in the bottom of each choux and scoop out some soft part.

  5. Once cooled, fill each choux with iced caviar.

  6. Brush with a mixture of aspic and meat glaze.

  7. Sprinkle with chopped pistachios and garnish with parsley 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. Pistachio + parsleytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together100 recipes

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

  2. Butter + caviartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together107 recipes

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

  3. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  4. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Butter + pistachiotop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together587 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

Swap the pistachio

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, caviar, meat, parsley):

  1. Walnutfits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Peasfits better
  4. Pistachiothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, caviar, meat, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

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