Name: Wild Duck
Ingredients: 1 duck; ½ cup coarse sea salt; 1 tablespoon dried sage; 1 cup strong vinegar; 3 tablespoons butter; 3 tablespoons flour; 3 large onions, chopped; 1 cup tomatoes; 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

Why it works: Onion and tomato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 20,633 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Wild Duck

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the duck

Parboil the duck in salted water with sage until tender.
Wash the duck in strong vinegar and let it soak in the vinegar while preparing the sauce.

Make the sauce

In a hot frying pan, melt the butter.
Add the flour and chopped onions, cooking until brown.
Stir in the tomatoes and Worcestershire sauce, cooking for 15 minutes.

Serve

Pour the sauce over the duck and keep it hot in a covered pan until ready to serve.

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.

Onion + tomatotop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together20,633 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Sage + tomatotop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together417 recipes

Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Sage + oniontop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,628 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Sage + flourtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,115 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Duck: Provides the main meat, which parboiling in salted water makes tender.
Flour: Thickens the sauce as it cooks with the butter and onions.
Onions: Add sweetness and savour as they cook down until brown.
Tomatoes: Add acidity and body to the sauce.
Butter: Carries the onions and flour and adds richness to the sauce.

Swap the sage

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, butter, flour, onion, tomato, sauce):

Capersfits better
Garlicfits better
Tarragonfits better
Sagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, butter, flour, onion, tomato, sauce. 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.