Why it works: Chicken and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,902 recipes. Both carry 2-furfurylthiol, which smells coffee, roasted. The science ↓
Poulets Rotis
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Prepare
Preheat your oven to 400°F (200°C).
Roast
If using a spit, roast the chicken while basting it with butter.
If using an oven, place the chicken in a roasting pan with butter and lard.
Roast for 30 to 40 minutes, depending on the size of the chicken.
Serve
Salt the chicken just before serving.
Carve the chicken and serve it on a platter, optionally with cress.
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.
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Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together13,902 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).
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, cooking through as it roasts.
- Butter
- Adds fat that carries flavour and helps the skin brown and stay moist.
- Lard
- Adds fat for richer flavour and helps the skin crisp and brown in the pan.
The step that matters
Roast for 30 to 40 minutes, depending on the size of the chicken. Cooking time depends on the bird's size, so a larger chicken needs the longer end. Roasting until the meat is fully cooked through matters for safety, and basting with fat keeps the surface from drying out.
“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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