Skip to main content
Main

French Dishes

Lettuce leaves stuffed with chicken farce, simmered in consommé and served with hot Spanish sauce and sherry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Caron, Pierre, fl. 1886-1899 · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 26 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Chicken and garlic are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and 10,839 recipes mention both. Both carry 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine, which smells roasted, nutty. The science ↓

The recipe

Ingredients

Contains: milk, wheat (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

Directions

Prepare the lettuce

  1. Boil eight lettuce leaves until tender.

  2. After boiling, place the leaves in cold water for a moment, dry with a cloth, and press out all the moisture.

  3. Divide each leaf in half, keeping the halves together.

Stuff and wrap

  1. Place about two ounces of chicken farce in each leaf.

  2. Cover the farce with lettuce leaves.

  3. Shape the leaves neatly, wrap them, and tie them up with thin pieces of pork.

Braise and serve

  1. Spread thin pieces of pork on the bottom of a saucepan.

  2. Add sliced carrot, onion, several branches of parsley, a little pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

  3. Place the wrapped lettuce on top of the pork and vegetables.

  4. Moisten the lettuce with consommé.

  5. Cover with buttered paper.

  6. Simmer gently for two hours.

  7. Drain the lettuce.

  8. Serve with half a pint of very hot Spanish sauce and a wineglass of sherry or madeira.

By Caron, Pierre, fl. 1886-1899. 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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Chicken + garlictop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together10,839 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  2. Cream + buttertop 3% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together41,494 recipes

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

  3. Garlic + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together27,044 recipes

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

  4. Butter + sherrytop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapstrong
    Mentioned together3,505 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  5. Cream + saucetop 6% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together4,786 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Lettuce leaves
Wrap the farce and hold its shape while the stuffed rolls cook.
Chicken farce
Forms a soft, moist filling that sets as it cooks inside the leaves.
Consommé (in the method)
Moistens the lettuce during simmering, adding savoury flavour and keeping it from drying.
Pork (in the method)
Lines the pan and wraps the rolls, adding fat and savoury flavour as it cooks.
Spanish sauce
Served hot alongside, adding richness and a sauced finish to the dish.

The step that matters

Press out all the moisture from the boiled lettuce. Excess water dilutes the farce and makes the wrapped leaves soggy and loose, so they may not hold their shape or set properly when simmered.

Flavor stand-ins for the garlic

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chicken, cream, butter, sauce, sherry, pepper, flour):

  1. Nutmegabout as good a flavor fit
  2. Tarragonabout as good a flavor fit
  3. Celeryabout as good a flavor fit
  4. Garlicthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, cream, butter, sauce, sherry, pepper, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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.

You might also like

Illustration of Chicken BrothIllustrationChicken Broth257 recipesIllustration of Corn FrittersIllustrationCorn Fritters203 recipesIllustration of Chicken SoupIllustrationChicken Soup156 recipesIllustration of Creamed ChickenIllustrationCreamed Chicken89 recipes