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Curry of Chicken, Tic Bbit or Veal

A curry made with curry powder, onions, butter, cream, and either chicken or veal.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Curry of Chicken, Tic Bbit or Veal

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and brown

  1. Cut the meat into serving pieces.

  2. Brown the meat in butter with sliced onions over high heat.

  3. Transfer the browned meat and onions to a saucepan.

Make the curry

  1. Add broth and simmer until the meat is cooked.

  2. Mix curry powder with flour and stir into the sauce.

  3. Let it simmer for 5 to 6 minutes.

  4. Add lemon juice and gradually stir in thick cream.

  5. Optionally, grind some meat and poultry livers to thicken the sauce.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Onion + meattop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,364 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Curry powder
Provides the main spiced flavour of the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the sauce as it simmers with the curry powder.
Thick cream
Adds richness and a smooth, mellow texture to the sauce.
Onions
Browned in butter, they add sweetness and depth to the sauce.
Butter
Browns the meat and onions and carries flavour into the sauce.
Meat
Forms the main body of the dish, cooked tender in the simmering broth.

The step that matters

Mix curry powder with flour and stir into the sauce. Raw flour and curry powder can taste pasty if not stirred in evenly and given time to simmer. Stirring well prevents lumps, and simmering cooks out the raw flour taste and lets the spices bloom in the sauce.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, coffee, cream, butter, meat, veal):

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, coffee, cream, butter, meat, veal. 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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