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Chicken Pie

A savory pie with chicken, lard, onions, herbs, cream, eggs, and a pastry crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 19 ingredients
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Why it works: Thyme and sage match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,485 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a deep oven‑safe dish, place the cut‑up chicken and add the lard; brown the chicken slightly.

  3. Add the chopped onion, parsley, thyme, sage, and black pepper to taste.

  4. Pour in the boiling water, stir well, and let it simmer until cooked through.

  5. In a bowl, mix the cream, butter, egg yolks, nutmeg, and spices; stir well.

Assemble and bake

  1. In another bowl, combine the flour, eggs, and lard to make a paste.

  2. Line a deep dish with the paste, adding layers of chicken and thin bacon.

  3. Sprinkle with large crumbs, pepper, and butter.

  4. Fill the dish with cold water and add the yolks of four to six hard‑boiled eggs.

  5. Dredge the top with flour and cover with the top crust.

  6. Bake gradually for two hours.

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. Thyme + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,485 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Parsley + sagetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Sage + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,388 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Forms the paste that makes the crust, giving it structure as it bakes.
Eggs
Bind the paste and add richness and structure to the crust.
Lard
Adds fat that makes the crust tender and flaky.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness to the savoury custard-like filling.
Hard-boiled egg yolks
Thicken and enrich the filling, adding body and a creamy texture.

The step that matters

Bake gradually for two hours. Slow, gentle heat lets the chicken cook through and the filling set without drying out or toughening the meat, while the crust bakes evenly.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, parsley, thyme, sage, pepper, cream, butter):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, parsley, thyme, sage, pepper, cream, 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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