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Salmis of Quails a L'empress

Roast or braised quails cooked in sauce, served with a potato border, potato puree, olives, and French red chillies.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 20 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Salmis of Quails a L'empress

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the quail

  1. Cut the roast or braised quails in half and dust with fine flour.

Cook

  1. Place the quails in a sauté pan and cover with the prepared sauce.

  2. Boil the quails in the sauce for 10 to 15 minutes.

Serve

  1. Dish the quails on a border of potato and garnish with potato puree, braised olives, and French red chillies.

  2. Pour the sauce around the dish and serve hot.

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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Olive + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,571 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans,trans-2,4-nonadienal (fatty, green).

  3. Potato + olivetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,458 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  5. Olive + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,779 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Fine flour
Dusting the quail halves helps the sauce cling and gives a light coating.
Brown sauce
Forms the main liquid that flavours and moistens the quail while it simmers.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing flavour and a smooth mouthfeel to the sauce.

The step that matters

Boiling the quails in the sauce. Boiling too hard can toughen the meat and break up the sauce. A gentle simmer keeps the quail tender and the sauce smooth while it cooks through.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (quail, flour, sauce, potato, olive, mushroom, butter):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against quail, flour, sauce, potato, olive, mushroom, butter. 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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