Skip to main content
Main

Poele to Boil Fowls in

A stew of veal and bacon with carrots, onions, and herbs, served with boiled fowls.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Lemon and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,973 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Poele to Boil Fowls in

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the stew

  1. Combine veal, bacon, carrots, onions, butter, lemon juice, thyme, bay leaves, salt, and pepper in a stewpan.

  2. Place the stewpan over medium heat and add a spoonful of boiling broth.

  3. Bring the mixture to a boil.

Prepare the fowls

  1. Soak the fowls in skimmed milk for 1–2 hours after trussing and singeing.

  2. Tie the fowls in a cloth and place them in cold water.

Cook and finish

  1. Set the water over low heat and cover.

  2. Once scum rises, remove it carefully and cover again.

  3. Simmer gently for 20 minutes.

  4. Remove from heat and let the steam finish cooking the fowls.

  5. Dress the fowls with a thin piece of puff pastry over the breast.

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. Lemon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,973 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Carrot + thymetop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Thyme + peppertop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Carrot + peppertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,555 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Veal
Provides the main meat, which becomes tender and flavourful during slow, gentle cooking.
Bacon
Releases fat and smoky flavour into the liquid, seasoning the whole stew.
Butter
Adds richness and a silky mouthfeel to the stew and its liquid.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the rich meat and fat.
Onions
Add sweetness and aromatic depth as they soften in the stew.
Carrots
Contribute natural sweetness and body to the stew.

The step that matters

Simmer gently, do not boil. Keeping the water at a gentle simmer cooks the meat evenly and keeps the liquid clear. Vigorous boiling toughens meat proteins and churns fat and scum into the broth, making it cloudy and greasy.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (veal, carrot, butter, lemon, thyme, pepper, milk):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, carrot, butter, lemon, thyme, pepper, milk. 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.

You might also like

Lemon SauceLemon Sauce236 recipesCarrot SoupCarrot Soup134 recipesVeal PattiesVeal Patties50 recipesBeef, Mutton, or Veal BrothBeef, Mutton, or Veal Broth6 recipes