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Chicken Bisque

A creamy soup made from boiled chicken, almonds, onions, parsley, and eggs, finished with cracker crumbs and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Chicken Bisque

Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Chicken Bisque

Ingredients

Directions

Make the broth

  1. Clean and boil the fowl slowly in the cold water until the flesh slips from the bones.

  2. Season with salt and pepper, then set aside in the broth until the next day.

  3. Skim the broth, remove the fowl, and bone and mince the flesh finely.

Combine and simmer

  1. Shred the almonds into small shavings and mix with the chopped meat, onions, and parsley.

  2. Strain the broth into a pot and add the mixture.

  3. Simmer gently for half an hour, ensuring it does not scorch.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the cracker crumbs, then stir in the beaten eggs mixed with hot milk.

  2. Remove from heat and set in boiling water for five minutes, covered, 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Almond + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together548 recipes

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

  5. Almond + oniontop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,769 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

Old fowl
Provides the flesh and flavorful broth that form the body of the bisque.
Raw eggs
Thicken the bisque gently as they set with heat, adding body and richness.
Cracker crumbs
Absorb liquid and help thicken the bisque slightly.
Blanched almonds
Add body and a rich, nutty flavor and texture to the soup.

The step that matters

Simmer gently and avoid scorching. Egg and milk are added later to thicken the bisque; high heat or a scorched base can curdle the eggs and leave a burnt taste, so the simmer must stay gentle.

Swap the almond

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (onion, parsley, milk, pepper, egg):

  1. Chickpeafits better
  2. Beansfits better
  3. Walnutfits better
  4. Almondthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against onion, parsley, milk, pepper, 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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