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Fillets of Fowl Larded, and Mushrooms

Fillets of fowl larded with force‑meat, baked with bacon, stock, herbs, mace, and served over mushrooms.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,626 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Fillets of Fowl Larded, and Mushrooms

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Lard the fillets of fowl and blanch them in cold water.

  2. Once boiling, remove from heat and set aside.

Braise and serve

  1. In a stewpan, combine any veal trimmings, onion, herbs, and mace with stock.

  2. Layer bacon sheets in the stewpan and place the fillets on top.

  3. Remove bones from the legs, fill with force-meat, sew them up, and add to the stewpan.

  4. Glaze the fillets and serve them on a bed of mushrooms.

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. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

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

  2. Meat + mushroomtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,423 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Onion + macetop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,078 recipes

    Shared aroma: eugenol (clove, spicy).

  4. Meat + oniontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

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

  5. Mace + mushroomtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,529 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

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

What each ingredient does

Fowl fillets
Provide the main lean meat, which stays tender and moist when gently cooked.
Bacon
Its fat bastes the fowl as it cooks and adds savoury flavour.
Stock
Gently cooks the fowl and forms the base of the braising liquid.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness as it simmers in the stock.
Mushrooms
Form the bed under the fowl, adding earthy flavour and moisture.
Force-meat
Fills the boned legs, adding richness and helping keep the shape moist.

The step that matters

Remove the fillets from the heat once the water boils. Blanching sets the outside of the meat. Letting the water keep boiling toughens lean fowl, so taking it off the heat promptly keeps the meat tender.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, onion, mushroom):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Celeryfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, onion, mushroom. 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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