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Pigeons Stewed with Cabbage

A stew of pigeons cooked with cabbage, seasoned with pepper and salt, thickened with cream, butter, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Pigeons Stewed with Cabbage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the cabbage

  1. Slice the cabbage as if for pickling, soak in water, and drain.

  2. Boil the cabbage in milk and water, then drain again.

Stew

  1. Layer some cabbage in a pan and place the pigeons on top, seasoned with pepper and salt.

  2. Cover the pigeons with the remaining cabbage and add a little broth.

  3. Stew gently until the pigeons are tender.

  4. Add cream, butter, and flour for thickening, then boil for a few minutes.

  5. Serve the pigeons in the center with cabbage arranged around them.

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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Cabbage + flourtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together978 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + flourtop 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

Pigeons
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender through long gentle stewing.
Cabbage
Forms the bed and cover for the pigeons, adding bulk and absorbing the cooking juices.
Flour
Thickens the cooking liquid into a light sauce when boiled with the cream and butter.
Cream
Adds richness and body to the sauce, softening its flavor.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps give the thickened sauce a smooth texture.

The step that matters

Add cream, butter, and flour for thickening, then boil for a few minutes.. Flour must be cooked through at a boil to thicken the liquid and lose its raw taste. Boiling too hard or too long can break a cream sauce, so keep it at a steady simmer.

Swap the cabbage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, cream, butter, flour):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, cream, butter, flour. 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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