Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
To Roast a Turkey
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Hang the turkey in a cool, airy place for up to two weeks before cooking.
Wash and dry the turkey thoroughly with clean cloths.
Fill the breast with forcemeat or sausage meat.
Roast
Truss the turkey firmly and place it over a clear fire.
Cover the breast with buttered writing paper for the first part of cooking, removing it 20 minutes before done.
Baste constantly with butter while roasting.
Serve
Serve with good brown gravy and bread sauce.
Optionally, garnish with fried sausages.
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.
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Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Turkey + breadtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together822 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Turkey + meattop 13% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together540 recipes
Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
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Turkey + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,592 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,924 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Turkey
- Forms the main body of the dish, with its meat cooked through by roasting.
- Forcemeat or sausage meat
- Fills the breast, adding moisture and seasoned flavour as the bird cooks.
- Butter
- Basting fat that promotes browning and adds richness to the skin.
The step that matters
Covering the breast with buttered paper. Covering the breast shields the lean meat from direct heat so it cooks more gently, while removing the paper near the end lets the skin brown. Timing the removal matters, since leaving it on too long prevents browning and removing it too early can dry the breast.
“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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