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Chicken Croquettes

Finely chopped chicken seasoned, bound with very thick cream sauce, shaped, breaded and fried in beef suet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Parsley and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,037 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Chicken Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Chop the chicken fine.

  2. Season the chicken with one-half teaspoon salt, one-half teaspoon celery salt, one-fourth saltspoon of cayenne pepper, one teaspoon white pepper, a few drops onion juice, one teaspoon chopped parsley and one teaspoon lemon juice.

  3. Make one pint of very thick cream sauce.

  4. Mix the cream sauce with the chicken.

Shape and coat

  1. Shape the mixture in the hand.

  2. Roll first in cracker crumbs, then in the yolk of an egg.

Fry

  1. Fry in beef suet.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

247Calories
33 gProtein
10 gFat
8 gCarbs

Counts 8 of 9 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 8 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Chicken100g cooked165
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Celery1 stalk (40g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Cayenne1 tsp (1.8g)6
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Saucenot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Mansfield, W. H., & co., Putnam, Conn., pub. [from old catalog]. 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. See the original page.

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. Parsley + lemontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together14,037 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Celery + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Celery + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,467 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  4. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. White pepper + parsleytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the bulk of the croquette and gives it its main flavour.
Cream sauce
Binds the chopped chicken together so the mixture holds its shape.
Egg yolk (in the method)
Helps the cracker crumb coating adhere and promotes browning when fried.

The step that matters

Make the cream sauce very thick. A thick sauce gives the mixture enough body to hold its shape when rolled and fried. A thin sauce would make the mixture loose and cause the croquettes to break apart or spread in the fat.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, celery, parsley, lemon, cream, sauce):

  1. Tarragonfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Marjoramfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, celery, parsley, lemon, cream, sauce. 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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