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Game Pie

Game pie is a savory pie made with game birds, salt pork, potatoes, and a rich crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 ↓

Game Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the birds

  1. Clean the birds well, inside and out, and split them in half.

  2. Place the birds in a saucepan with 2 quarts of water and bring to a boil.

  3. Skim off any scum that rises, then add salt, pepper, parsley, onion, and cloves.

  4. Add the diced salt pork and boil until tender, ensuring the birds are covered with water.

Make the gravy

  1. Thicken the mixture with 2 tablespoons of browned flour and let it boil.

  2. Stir in the butter, remove from heat, and let it cool.

  3. Prepare the diced potatoes and a rich pie crust.

Assemble and bake

  1. Line a buttered pudding dish with the crust, layer in the birds, then some potatoes, and repeat until full.

  2. Pour the gravy over the layers, cover with the top crust, and cut a slit in the center.

  3. Bake at 350°F (175°C) until golden brown.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  3. Parsley + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  4. Quail + porktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together308 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Small birds
Provide the meat that makes up the main filling of the pie.
Salt pork
Adds fat and savory flavor as it renders into the broth while boiling.
Browned flour
Thickens the liquid into a gravy that binds the layers together.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the finished gravy.
Potatoes
Add starchy bulk and body between the layers of birds.

The step that matters

Thickening the gravy with browned flour. Flour must be fully cooked through while boiling, or the gravy will taste raw and pasty. Stirring to prevent lumps keeps the sauce smooth enough to bind the layers.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (quail, pepper, parsley, onion, pork, flour, butter):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Garlicfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against quail, pepper, parsley, onion, pork, flour, butter. 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.

More game pie recipes

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