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Chicken En Casserole

A casserole of stewed chicken with mushrooms, vegetables, and a butter‑flour sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Chicago. Bethany union church. Woman's society. [from old catalog] · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and carrot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,053 recipes. Both carry 2,4-decadienal, which smells seaweed. The science ↓

Chicken En Casserole

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Clean and dress the chicken pieces.

  2. Stew or steam the chicken until tender.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a frying pan.

  2. Add all the vegetables (mushrooms, carrot, onion, celery) chopped finely and cook five minutes, then add the flour.

  3. Add all the seasonings (parsley, salt, pepper) to the hot water, pour into the pan, and cook five minutes.

Bake and serve

  1. Put the chicken in a casserole dish, dredge with flour, dust with salt and pepper, and pour the pan contents over it.

  2. Place the casserole in the oven and cook until the chicken is thoroughly browned, about one and a half hours, at medium heat.

  3. Remove from the oven, cover the dish, and serve.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

819Calories
49 gProtein
17 gFat
116 gCarbs

Counts 10 of 11 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 10 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Chicken100g cooked165
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Carrot1 medium (61g)25
Mushroom1/2 cup sliced (35g)15
Celery1 stalk (40g)6
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Parsley1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)1
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot 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 Chicago. Bethany union church. Woman's society. [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 + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,053 recipes

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

  2. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Parsley + celerytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,810 recipes

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

  4. Chicken + mushroomtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,172 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-butyl acetate (fruity, banana).

  5. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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; stewing or steaming first makes it tender before baking.
Butter
Fat for cooking the vegetables, adding richness and carrying flavor through the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the pan sauce and helps the chicken brown and coat evenly.
Mushrooms
Adds savory, earthy flavor and moisture to the sauce.
Onion
Adds aromatic sweetness and depth as it cooks in the butter.

The step that matters

Baking until thoroughly browned. The chicken is already cooked through, so the long bake mainly drives browning and flavor. Heat too high or too long can dry the meat and toughen its surface, so watch the color rather than only the clock.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, parsley, flour, celery, butter, mushroom, carrot):

  1. Leekfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Potatofits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, parsley, flour, celery, butter, mushroom, carrot. 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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