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Salmi of Partridge

A partridge stew with mushrooms, herbs, and a wine vinegar and port sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 17 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Salmi of Partridge

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat.

  2. Add mushrooms, carrot, shallots, mace, bay leaf, parsley, thyme, onion with cloves, and ham. Stir until lightly browned.

  3. Sprinkle flour over the mixture and let it brown slightly.

  4. Gently stir in the brown stock.

  5. Add the wine vinegar and port. Simmer until reduced.

Finish and serve

  1. Strain the sauce and return it to the pan with the partridge pieces.

  2. Heat until everything is hot, then serve immediately garnished with toast sippets.

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 + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Carrot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Shallot + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,737 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Shallot + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,476 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Thyme + clovetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Partridges
Provide the main cooked meat, which is gently reheated in the finished sauce.
Butter
Carries the vegetables and ham, adding richness and helping them brown.
Flour
Thickens the sauce and browns slightly with the vegetables for added color and flavor.
Brown stock
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving body and savoury depth.
Port
Adds sweetness and depth as it reduces into the sauce.
French wine vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens and balances the rich, sweet sauce.

The step that matters

Simmer until reduced. Reducing the vinegar and port concentrates their flavour and thickens the sauce. Simmering gently prevents scorching and keeps the sauce smooth, while reheating the partridge must not boil it hard or the meat toughens.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, mushroom, carrot, shallot, parsley, thyme, clove):

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Winter savoryfits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, mushroom, carrot, shallot, parsley, thyme, clove. 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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