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Cailles En Papillotes [Quails in Paste Cnist]

Quails stuffed with sautéed vegetables, wrapped in puff pastry, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and celery match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,173 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

Cailles En Papillotes [Quails in Paste Cnist]

Oven, in the book's wordsA fairly hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a fairly hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Pluck and singe the quails, then bone the breasts from the inside.

  3. Finely shred the onions, carrot, celery, and mushrooms.

  4. Fry the shredded vegetables in butter until light brown, stirring frequently, then let cool.

  5. Season the mixture, moisten with meat glaze, and spread it on a plate to cool.

Assemble and bake

  1. Shape the mixture into small balls and insert one into each quail, shaping them neatly.

  2. Enclose each quail in rough puff pastry like a dumpling.

  3. Place the quails on a baking sheet, brush with egg yolk, and bake for about 30 minutes.

Serve

  1. Serve on an entree dish with a folded napkin and a boat of well-flavored sauce Madere.

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. Carrot + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Onion + carrottop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  4. Onion + celerytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,518 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Carrot + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,796 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

Quails
Provide the meat that is cooked inside the pastry, with the filling adding moisture.
Butter
Fries the shredded vegetables to a light brown, adding richness and browning flavor.
Rough puff pastry
Encloses each quail and bakes into a flaky, layered crust.
Meat glaze
Moistens the vegetable filling and adds concentrated savory flavor.
Mushrooms
Add earthy flavor and moisture to the vegetable filling.

The step that matters

Frying the shredded vegetables until light brown. Frying until light brown develops savory, browned flavor through the Maillard reaction, while stirring prevents scorching and uneven cooking. Letting the mixture cool before filling keeps the pastry from becoming soggy or melting early.

Swap the celery

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (quail, onion, carrot, mushroom, butter, meat, sauce):

  1. Garlicfits about as well
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Celerythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against quail, onion, carrot, mushroom, butter, meat, sauce. 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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