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Baked Spring Chicken

A whole chicken baked with butter, salt, and pepper, served with a butter cream dressing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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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 ↓

Baked Spring Chicken

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Cut the chicken in half down the back and spread it open flat.

  2. Flatten the breastbone by giving it two or three blows with a rolling pin.

  3. Place the chicken skin side down in a dripping pan.

  4. Sprinkle with coarse sea salt and bits of butter.

Bake and finish

  1. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven, basting frequently with butter.

  2. Add a little water to the pan if necessary to prevent burning.

  3. Once done, transfer to a hot platter, dust with pepper, and add generous bits of butter on top.

  4. Return to the oven briefly to melt the butter.

  5. Make a cream dressing with the remaining butter in the pan.

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. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  2. Chicken + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,958 recipes

    Shared aroma: piperonal (bitter, coconut).

  3. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the main body of the dish, cooking through as the meat firms and browns.
Butter
Adds moisture and richness, and promotes browning on the skin when basted.

The step that matters

Basting frequently with butter. Regular basting spreads fat over the skin, helping it brown evenly and keeping the surface from drying out during roasting.

“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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