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Pheasant Pie

A pheasant pie filled with forcemeat of bread, veal, bacon, suet, ham, truffles, spices, and egg yolks, baked in bacon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and mace 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 ↓

Pheasant Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the forcemeat

  1. Bone the pheasants carefully and prepare the forcemeat by mixing the grated bread, pounded veal, fat bacon, minced beef suet, and grated lean ham in equal quantities.

  2. Season the mixture with truffles, nutmeg, mace, pepper, salt, and garlic, then bind it with the beaten egg yolks.

Assemble the pie

  1. Stuff part of the forcemeat inside the pheasants and fry them for a few minutes.

  2. Place the pheasants in a deep dish lined with slices of fat bacon and some forcemeat at the bottom.

  3. Add the brandy, more forcemeat, and cover with slices of fat bacon.

Bake and serve

  1. If using a dish, cover it with coarse paste and bake for 4 to 5 hours at 300°F (150°C).

  2. When ready to serve, remove the coarse paste and cover with rich puff paste, baking until golden.

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

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  2. Bread + hamtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  3. Pheasant + beeftop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together131 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Veal + truffletop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together815 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  5. Veal + beeftop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Pheasants
Provide the main meat, which becomes tender during the long, slow bake.
Grated bread
Absorbs liquid and gives the forcemeat a soft, binding body.
Fat bacon
Adds fat and moisture, keeping the meat and forcemeat from drying out.
Beaten egg yolks
Bind the forcemeat and help it set firm when cooked.
Minced beef suet
Adds richness and moisture to the forcemeat.
Brandy
Adds aroma and flavour to the pie's filling.

The step that matters

Slow bake for 4 to 5 hours at 300°F (150°C). Long, low heat lets the pheasant and forcemeat cook through gently and become tender. Higher heat would tighten the meat and dry the filling out.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pheasant, bread, veal, beef, ham, truffle, nutmeg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pheasant, bread, veal, beef, ham, truffle, nutmeg. 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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