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Squabs Il l’Americaine

Roasted squabs served with bacon, gravy, and fresh watercress.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Squab and butter work together. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 48 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

Squabs Il l’Americaine

Oven, in the book's wordsThe hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “the hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the squabs

  1. Singe the squabs.

  2. Draw the squabs.

  3. Truss the squabs.

  4. Stuff the squabs with American forcemeat.

  5. Place the squabs in a roasting pan.

  6. Sprinkle the squabs with salt.

  7. Spread butter evenly over the squabs.

Roast and make the gravy

  1. Roast the squabs in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C) for 18 minutes.

  2. Remove the squabs from the oven.

  3. Untruss the squabs.

  4. Skim the fat off the gravy.

  5. Add broth to the gravy.

  6. Bring the gravy to a boil.

  7. Strain the gravy into a sauce bowl.

Serve

  1. Decorate the dish with fresh watercress.

  2. Top each squab with a slice of broiled bacon.

  3. Serve.

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. Squab + buttertop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together48 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Butter + watercresstop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together842 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Squab + watercresstop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2 recipes

    Shared aroma: geraniol (rose, geranium).

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

What each ingredient does

Squabs
Provide the main meat, which is roasted whole and stuffed.
Butter
Adds fat that enriches the skin and promotes gentle browning during roasting.
Broth
Forms the base of the gravy, adding liquid and savory flavor.
Broiled bacon
Adds smoky, salty fat that flavors each squab when placed on top.

The step that matters

Roast the squabs in a hot oven. Roasting at high heat for a set time browns the skin and cooks the meat through. Overcooking dries the lean breast meat, while undercooking leaves the dark meat unsafe to eat.

“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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