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Dessert

Fricassée De Poulet

A French chicken stew simmered with onions, garlic, herbs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Fricassée De Poulet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Pluck the chicken and remove the bladder by making a 2.5‑inch slit at the back of the neck.

  2. Cut off the chicken's rear and remove the fat to take out the gizzard, liver, heart, and lungs.

  3. Flame the chicken and remove the heart and any bitter parts.

  4. Cut the chicken into pieces, starting with the breast and separating the wings and thighs.

  5. Place the chicken pieces in a 3‑liter pot, ensuring each piece is covered with skin.

  6. Fill the pot with water and let it soak for 1 hour.

  7. Discard the first water and add 12 deciliters of fresh water, onions, clove, bouquet garni, salt, and pepper.

Cook and cool

  1. Bring to a boil, skim off any foam, and simmer covered for 30 minutes.

  2. Check the chicken for doneness, then drain and place in cold water for 5 minutes.

  3. Reserve the cooking liquid in a bowl.

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. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

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

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

  4. Onion + clovetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,901 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonanone (fruity, floral).

  5. Onion + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 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

Chicken
Provides the main protein and body of the dish, with skin and bones adding flavour during simmering.
Onions
Add sweetness and aroma to the cooking liquid as it simmers.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and contributing to a smooth texture.

The step that matters

Skimming the foam after boiling. Foam is coagulated protein and impurities that rise as the water heats. Skimming it keeps the cooking liquid clear and clean-tasting, which matters because this liquid is reserved for the sauce.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, onion, pepper, butter):

  1. Garlicfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Parsleyfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, onion, pepper, 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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