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Stewed Chicken

A stew of chicken pieces simmered in a thickened broth of flour, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Stewed Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Place the chicken pieces in a kettle and nearly cover with boiling water.

  2. Bring the mixture to a boil.

  3. Simmer until the chicken is tender.

  4. Remove the chicken, skin, and carefully bone it.

Make the sauce

  1. In the chicken broth, mix 1 pint of flour with a little cold water.

  2. Stir the mixture and bring it to a boil.

  3. Add 1½ ounces of ground white pepper and 24 pounds of coarse sea salt.

  4. For a richer sauce, add a portion of cream and egg yolks if desired.

Can and process

  1. Pack the chicken in cans and cover with the sauce.

  2. Process 1 lb. cans at 250°F (120°C) for 55 minutes or 2 lb. cans for 65 minutes.

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. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + creamtop 20% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetaldehyde (pungent, ethereal).

  3. White pepper + eggtop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,312 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

  4. Chicken + creamtop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,241 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Cream + eggtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Provides the meat and the broth that forms the base of the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the broth into a sauce that coats the chicken.
Cream
Adds richness and a smoother, fuller texture to the sauce.
Egg yolks
Enrich and thicken the sauce, adding body and a smoother texture.

The step that matters

Add the seasoning and thicken the sauce before canning. Flour must be fully cooked into the boiling broth to thicken smoothly and lose its raw taste. Salt and pepper levels set the flavor throughout the sealed cans, so they should be checked before packing.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, flour, cream, egg):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Jalapenofits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, flour, cream, egg. 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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