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Pigeon Pie

A savory pie made with pigeons, stuffing or mashed potatoes, butter, and a puff pastry crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 13 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 ↓

Pigeon Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA quick oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the pigeons

  1. Clean and truss the pigeons.

  2. Rub the outside and inside of the pigeons with pepper and salt.

  3. Rub the inside of the pigeons with butter.

  4. Fill the pigeons with stuffing or mashed potatoes.

  5. Sew up the slit in the pigeons.

Assemble the pie

  1. Butter the sides of a tin basin or pudding dish.

  2. Line the sides of the dish with pie paste rolled to ¼ inch thickness.

  3. Place the pigeons inside the lined dish.

  4. Cut the sweet butter into pieces.

  5. Place the butter pieces over the pigeons.

  6. Sprinkle the pigeons with salt, pepper, and parsley if desired.

  7. Dredge the pigeons with flour.

  8. Add water to nearly fill the pie.

  9. Lay skewers across the top of the pie.

  10. Cover the pie with puff pastry.

  11. Cut a slit in the middle of the puff pastry.

  12. Decorate the edge of the pastry with pastry leaves or braids.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake the pie in a 400°F (200°C) oven for one hour.

  2. Brush the top of the pie with beaten egg yolk before serving.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  3. Bread + wheattop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together209 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  4. Parsley + wheattop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together345 recipes

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

  5. Wheat + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,373 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Pigeons
Provide the main meat, which cooks through slowly inside the pie.
Stuffing or mashed potatoes
Fill the birds, adding moisture and absorbing rich juices as they cook.
Sweet butter
Adds richness and moisture as it melts over the pigeons during baking.
Wheat flour
Dredged over the pigeons, it helps thicken the juices into a gravy.
Puff pastry
Forms a flaky, golden crust that seals in the filling.
Egg yolk
Brushed on top, it promotes browning and a glossy finish.

The step that matters

Covering and sealing the pie before baking. Skewers hold the pastry up off the filling, and a sealed crust with a vent traps steam so the birds cook through and the juices thicken rather than dry out.

Swap the parsley

The recipe marks parsley as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, butter, bread, wheat, flour, egg):

  1. Nutmegfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Turmericfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, bread, wheat, flour, egg. 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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