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To Broil Pigeons Whole

Whole pigeons stuffed with forcemeat, broiled until browned, served with butter and gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

To Broil Pigeons Whole

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean the pigeons well and cut off the wings and neck, leaving enough skin at the neck to tie.

  2. Make a forcemeat by mixing bread crumbs, pigeon livers, anchovy, minced parsley, and butter.

  3. Season the mixture with salt, pepper, and nutmeg, then bind it with the beaten egg yolk.

Stuff and season

  1. Stuff each pigeon with a piece of forcemeat the size of a large walnut and tie the neck and rump.

  2. Rub the pigeons with butter and dust them with a mixture of pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

Broil and serve

  1. Broil the pigeons over a slow fire until they are nicely browned, basting them with melted butter using a brush.

  2. Serve with melted butter and parsley or a thickened brown gravy.

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

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

  2. Parsley + nutmegtop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Bread + anchovytop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,260 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanol (green, fruity).

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 cooks through and browns under the broiler.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and give the forcemeat body so it holds its shape inside the bird.
Pigeon livers
Add a rich, savoury flavour and soft texture to the forcemeat.
Egg yolk
Binds the forcemeat together so it stays cohesive when stuffed and cooked.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and promotes browning on the outside of the birds.

The step that matters

Broil over a slow fire and baste. Slow heat lets the bird cook through before the skin over-browns, and regular basting with butter keeps the surface moist and evenly coloured.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Sagefits about as well
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, liver, anchovy, parsley, butter, 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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