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To Roast a Turkey Poult with Truffles

A roasted turkey poult stuffed with liver forcemeat and truffles.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

To Roast a Turkey Poult with Truffles

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the bird

  1. Prepare the turkey poult by cutting off the lower part of the bill and twisting the neck skin around the head.

  2. Bring the feet close to the thighs and trim the toe nails.

Make the forcemeat

  1. Make the forcemeat by mixing the liver, bread crumbs, bacon, parsley, chives, thyme, salt, and pepper.

  2. Combine the forcemeat with the egg yolk and truffles to fill the bird.

Roast and serve

  1. Lard the turkey poult and roast it at 400°F (200°C) for about an hour, or longer if large.

  2. Serve with bread sauce or truffle sauce.

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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  3. Parsley + chivetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,150 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Chive + thymetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

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

What each ingredient does

Turkey poult
Forms the main body of the dish, carrying the stuffing and roasting as a whole bird.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and give the forcemeat a light, binding body.
Egg yolk
Binds the forcemeat together so it holds its shape when roasted.
Bacon
Adds fat and savory flavor that moistens the lean forcemeat as it cooks.
Truffles
Contribute a deep, earthy aroma to the forcemeat and the finished dish.

The step that matters

Lard the turkey poult and roast it at 400°F (200°C) for about an hour, or longer if large.. Larding adds fat that keeps the lean poult moist during roasting. Because the bird is lean and the forcemeat is dense, it can dry out or cook unevenly if the time is not adjusted to its size.

Swap the chive

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, liver, bread, parsley, thyme, pepper, egg):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Chivethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, liver, bread, parsley, thyme, pepper, egg. 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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