Why it works: Pepper and cranberry work together. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 218 recipes. Both carry ethyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓
Baked Squabs
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the squabs
Clean the squabs.
Truss the squabs.
Rub the breasts with a piece of onion.
Divide the butter into six equal parts.
Place one part of butter inside each squab.
Place one cranberry inside each squab.
Cut the bacon into thin slices.
Place one slice of bacon over each squab.
Add the stock to the baking pan.
Add salt to taste.
Add pepper to taste.
Roast
Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 45 minutes.
Baste the squabs every 10 minutes.
Make the sauce and serve
Boil the livers and hearts in a stewing pan.
Remove the bacon from the pan.
Add one tablespoon of butter to the pan and brown the butter.
Add one tablespoon of flour to the pan.
Add the mashed livers and hearts to the pan and mix well.
Stir in half a cup of stock and cook until it boils.
Season with salt and pepper.
Serve the squabs on buttered toast with the sauce poured around them, accompanied by green peas.
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.
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Pepper + cranberrytop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together218 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Butter + cranberrytop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together291 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
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Squab + buttertop 20% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together48 recipes
Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
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Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together85,593 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Squab + peppertop 22% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together35 recipes
Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Squabs
- Provide the main meat, which cooks through and browns in the oven.
- Butter
- Adds richness and moisture inside the birds and browns to flavour the sauce.
- Bacon
- Its fat bastes the squabs and flavours the birds as it renders.
- Flour (in the method)
- Thickens the pan sauce when cooked with the butter and stock.
The step that matters
Basting the squabs every 10 minutes. Regular basting spreads rendered fat and pan juices over the skin, helping it brown and keeping the lean breast meat from drying out during roasting.
Swap the cranberry
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (squab, butter, pepper):
- Lemonfits better
- Figfits about as well
- Cranberrythe original
- Grapefits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against squab, butter, pepper. 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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