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Roast Quail, Stuffed

A roasted quail stuffed with bread or meat, served with gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Roast Quail, Stuffed

Oven, in the book's wordsThe hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the quail

  1. Clean, wash, and dry the quails.

  2. Stuff them with dry bread or meat stuffing and tie securely.

  3. Place in a pan and season with salt and pepper.

  4. Add enough water to cover the bottom of the pan.

  5. Place a strip of bacon over each quail.

  6. Cover the quails with buttered paper.

Roast and brown

  1. Roast in a 400°F (200°C) oven for 15 minutes.

  2. Remove the paper.

  3. Return to oven to brown, turning frequently.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Combine 1 pint of stock and 1 large spoonful of beef bouillon in the dripping pan.

  2. Boil for 5 minutes.

  3. Strain.

  4. Remove fat.

  5. Season with salt and pepper.

  6. Serve on toast with a little gravy poured over.

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + beeftop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  3. Quail + beeftop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together48 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Bread + beeftop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

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

  5. Quail + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together512 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Quails
Provide the main meat, which is stuffed and roasted whole.
Bacon
Bastes the birds with its fat as it renders, adding flavor and moisture.
Butter
Enriches the buttered paper that covers the quail, helping keep the surface from drying.
Good stock
Forms the base of the gravy, carrying savory flavor.
Beef bouillon
Concentrates savory, meaty flavor in the gravy.

The step that matters

Return to oven to brown, turning frequently. Once the paper is removed, the surface can dry out or scorch unevenly. Turning often lets the fat and drippings brown the birds evenly while the interior finishes cooking.

“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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