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Turkey a LA Flamande, Or, Dinde POUDr£e

A stuffed turkey seasoned with salt, sugar, sausage, bread crumbs, lemon, spices, and coated with breadcrumbs, served cold with a lemon‑mustard sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Lemon and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Turkey a LA Flamande, Or, Dinde POUDr£e

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the bird

  1. Wipe the turkey inside with a dry cloth; do not wash it.

  2. Sprinkle a little salt inside to draw out the blood.

  3. Let it sit for 2 hours.

  4. Drain and wipe again.

Cure the turkey

  1. Rub the outside of the turkey with ½ cup coarse sea salt mixed with 1 tablespoon pounded sugar.

  2. Turn it every day for 4 days.

Stuff and cook

  1. Fill the turkey with equal parts sausage meat and bread crumbs soaked in boiling milk, seasoned with lemon rind, nutmeg, mace, cayenne, and fine herbs.

  2. Sew the turkey securely, roll it in a cloth, and tie it at both ends.

  3. Boil the turkey gently in water for 3 to 4 hours.

Coat and serve

  1. Once cooked, coat it thickly with fine bread crumbs mixed with chopped parsley.

  2. Serve cold with a sauce made from lemon juice, lemon rind, mustard, pounded sugar, and enough oil to balance the acidity. Mix well.

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. Lemon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

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

  2. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Nutmeg + macetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Lemon + nutmegtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,318 recipes

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

  5. Turkey + breadtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together822 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Fine hen turkey
Provides the main protein that sets firm and holds the stuffing when cooked.
Sausage meat
Adds fat and seasoned richness that keeps the stuffing moist as it cooks.
Bread crumbs soaked in milk or cream
Absorbs liquid and holds moisture, keeping the stuffing soft rather than dry.
Coarse sea salt
Draws moisture out of the bird and seasons it deeply during the cure.
Lemon juice
Brings acidity that brightens the sauce and cuts the richness of the oil.
Oil
Adds fat that gives the sauce body and carries its flavors.

The step that matters

Boil the turkey gently in water for 3 to 4 hours.. A gentle simmer cooks the bird evenly. A hard rolling boil toughens the meat's proteins and can tear the cloth and dry the outer layers.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turkey, sugar, meat, bread, lemon, nutmeg, parsley):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turkey, sugar, meat, bread, lemon, nutmeg, parsley. 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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