Name: Bouillon Rafraichissant De Poulet
Ingredients: 1 young chicken, dressed and cut up; 2 liters cold water (about 8 cups); 1 carrot, chopped; 1 turnip, chopped; coarse sea salt (to taste); 1 lettuce, cleaned and washed; a handful of sorrel; a handful of chervil; a few leaves of Swiss chard

Why it works: Sorrel and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 247 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Bouillon Rafraichissant De Poulet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the broth

Remove the gills and blood parts from the chicken and place it in a small pot.
Add 8 cups of cold water, then add the chopped carrot, turnip, and salt.
Bring to a gentle boil and simmer for 2 hours.

Add the greens and serve

Add the cleaned lettuce and bring to a boil again.
Add the sorrel, chervil, and Swiss chard, then cover the pot and remove it from heat.
Let it steep for 15 minutes, then strain the broth through a fine sieve.
Carefully degrease the broth and serve warm.

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.

Sorrel + cherviltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together247 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Lettuce + cherviltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together396 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Lettuce + sorreltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together317 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Turnip + sorreltop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together179 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
Chervil + chardtop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together7 recipes

Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Young chicken: Gives the broth its main body and savory meaty flavor as it simmers.
Carrot: Adds subtle sweetness and aroma to the broth.
Turnip: Contributes mild sweetness and a gentle vegetable aroma to the broth.
Lettuce: Adds fresh, delicate vegetal flavor when briefly boiled in the broth.
Sorrel: Adds bright acidity that lifts the broth's flavor.

The step that matters

Carefully degrease the broth. Fat rises and collects on the surface as the broth cools and simmers. Skimming it off gently keeps the broth clear and prevents a greasy mouthfeel, while disturbing the surface can re-emulsify fat into the liquid.

Swap the carrot

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, turnip, lettuce, sorrel, chervil, chard):

Beetrootfits better
Kalefits better
Shallotfits better
Carrotthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, turnip, lettuce, sorrel, chervil, chard. 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.

Chicken Broth257 recipes

Chicken Soup156 recipes

Carrot Soup134 recipes

Creamed Chicken89 recipes

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Bouillon Rafraichissant De Poulet