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Partridges, a LA Ragley

Partridges à la Ragley are boiled partridges served with a tomato‑sherry sauce and liver purée on crostini.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 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 ↓

Partridges, a LA Ragley

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the partridges

  1. Truss the partridges like chickens for boiling.

  2. In a stewpan, heat the oil and herbs, then add the partridges and sauté for a few minutes.

  3. Add sherry, stock, tomato pulp, salt, cayenne, and peppercorns; stir and bring to a boil.

Cook and make the purée

  1. Cover and cook, shaking occasionally, until the partridges are done.

  2. Cook the livers in the stock briefly, then make a purée with minced ham, tomato pulp, and seasoning.

  3. Add a few drops of carmine to the purée and place a portion on each crostini.

Serve

  1. Serve the partridges on a hot dish, skim and strain the sauce, and pour it over the birds; garnish with crostini.

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. Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  5. Tomato + parsleytop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,398 recipes

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

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 cooks gently in the covered stewpan until tender.
Sherry
Adds acidity and a rich aroma that flavours the sauce.
Stock
Forms the cooking liquid that braises the birds and becomes the sauce.
Tomato pulp
Adds acidity, body and colour to the sauce and purée.
Liver
Contributes richness and a smooth, spreadable texture in the purée.

The step that matters

Cover and cook until the partridges are done. Gentle, covered cooking with occasional shaking keeps the lean game birds moist and tender; overcooking dries the meat and toughens the fibres.

Swap the tomato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sherry, pepper, parsley, clove, liver):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against sherry, pepper, parsley, clove, liver. 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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