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A method of cooking grouse or partridges with salt, pepper, mace, nutmeg, butter, and port wine, then potting in clarified butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Mace and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,557 recipes. Both carry myristicin, which smells spice, warm. The science ↓

To Pot Grouse or Partridges

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the birds

  1. Prepare the birds by removing the head and cleaning them thoroughly.

  2. Season the inside and outside of the birds with salt, pepper, mace, and nutmeg.

Bake

  1. Place about 1 ounce of butter inside each bird and pack them closely in a baking dish.

  2. Pour ⅓ to ⅔ cup of port wine over the birds.

  3. Cover with butter and seal the dish with a coarse paste.

  4. Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven for 1 hour.

Pot and serve

  1. Once cooled, remove the crust and butter, and dry the birds from the gravy.

  2. Place one bird in each small potting pot and cover with clarified butter.

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 + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Butter + port winetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,499 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Mace + port winetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together695 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  5. Pepper + macetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,257 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

Pepper and mace barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 12,257 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

Grouse or partridges
Provide the lean meat that becomes the tender, richly flavoured potted dish.
Butter
Adds moisture and richness and seals the birds from air as it sets around them.
Port wine
Adds moisture and a sweet, fruity depth to the gravy that cooks with the birds.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, nutmeg, butter, port wine):

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Clovefits better
  3. Allspicefits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, nutmeg, butter, port wine. 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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