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 ↓
Roast Grouse
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Truss the grouse as you would a pheasant.
Cover the grouse with fat bacon.
Roast
Roast in front of a brisk fire or bake at 400°F (200°C) for about 20 minutes.
A few minutes before finishing, remove the bacon.
Baste the grouse with butter.
Dust the grouse with flour and brown quickly.
Serve
Serve on buttered toast with rich brown gravy and bread sauce.
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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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + saucetop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together15,338 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Flour + saucetop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,078 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
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Bread + saucetop 22% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together4,934 recipes
Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Grouse
- The main meat, cooked whole so it stays moist under its fat covering.
- Bacon
- Fat laid over the bird that bastes the meat and adds savoury flavour as it cooks.
- Butter
- Basting fat that adds richness and helps the skin turn golden brown.
- Flour
- Dusted over the skin, it helps form a crisp, browned surface.
The step that matters
Removing the bacon a few minutes before finishing. Taking off the bacon late lets the skin brown directly. Leaving it on longer would keep the surface pale and soft, so the butter and flour need direct heat to brown the bird quickly.
“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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