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Stewed Pigeon

A pigeon seasoned with butter, flour, pepper, and salt, simmered over vegetables, then broiled and served on toast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Stewed Pigeon

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Roll the butter in flour, pepper, and salt, then place it inside the pigeon.

  2. Create a bed of vegetables in a pan and lay the pigeon on top.

Cook

  1. Simmer for 1 hour.

  2. Transfer the pigeon to a baking tin, dust with flour, and brown it under the broiler or in the oven.

  3. Strain the sauce from the vegetables, then add ketchup, pepper, and salt.

  4. Serve the pigeon on toast.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + ketchuptop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,435 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Pigeon
Is the main protein, becoming tender through slow simmering.
Flour
Dusted on the pigeon so it browns and forms a light crust under heat.
Butter
Adds fat and moisture that keeps the bird rich as it cooks.
Ketchup
Adds sweetness and acidity to the strained sauce.

The step that matters

Browning the pigeon under the broiler or in the oven. Flour and the bird's surface sugars and proteins brown only with dry, high heat. Browning adds colour and flavour that the moist simmering cannot produce, so the bird should be watched closely to avoid scorching.

“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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