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Stuffed Partridges

Stuffed partridges baked with biscuit crumbs, ham, butter, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Biscuit and pepper work together. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 841 recipes. Both carry nonanal, which smells fat, citrus. The science ↓

Stuffed Partridges

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Dress the partridges as you would a chicken for baking, sprinkling salt inside and out.

  2. Stuff the birds with a mixture of biscuit crumbs, chopped ham, 2 tablespoons of butter, and seasoning.

Bake

  1. Place the birds in a pan that will just hold them, rub with butter, and lightly dredge with flour.

  2. Cut 1 pound of butter into the pint of water and pour over the birds.

  3. Set in a hot oven at 400°F (200°C), baste well, and brown nicely.

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. Biscuit + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together841 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  2. Ham + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,475 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  3. Biscuit + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,009 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Biscuit + hamtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together64 recipes

    Shared aroma: nonanal (fat, citrus).

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

What each ingredient does

Partridges
Provide the main meat, which is cooked whole and stuffed.
Biscuit crumbs
Absorb juices in the stuffing, keeping it moist and tender.
Butter
Adds fat that carries heat and promotes browning of the skin.
Lean ham
Adds salty, savoury flavour to the stuffing.

The step that matters

Basting and browning in a hot oven. Basting with the butter and water mixture keeps the lean birds from drying out, while the hot oven drives Maillard browning on the surface. Too little basting leaves the meat dry and the skin pale.

“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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