Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Fried Chicken
Ingredients
Directions
Fry the chicken
Wash and cut up a young chicken. Wipe it dry.
Season with salt and pepper.
Dredge it with flour, or dip each piece in beaten egg and then in cracker crumbs.
Heat one ounce each of butter and sweet lard in a frying pan until boiling hot.
Lay the chicken in the pan and fry until browned on both sides.
Remove the chicken, drain it, and set aside in a covered dish.
Stir into the remaining gravy a large tablespoonful of flour, make it smooth.
Add a cup of cream or milk, season with salt and pepper, and boil up.
Pour the gravy over the chicken.
Some like chopped parsley added to the gravy.
Serve hot.
If the chicken is old, put it into a stewpan with a little water and simmer gently until tender.
Season with salt and pepper.
Dip in flour or cracker crumb and egg, and fry as above.
Use the broth the chicken was cooked in to make the gravy, instead of the cream or milk, or use an equal quantity of both.
Make the chicken cakes
Put a cup of cream or milk in a saucepan and set it over the fire.
When it boils, add a lump of butter as large as an egg, in which a tablespoonful of flour has been mixed.
Let it boil up thick.
Remove from the fire, and when cool, mix into it a teaspoonful of salt, half a teaspoonful of pepper, a bit of minced onion or parsley, one cup of fine bread crumbs, and a pint of finely-chopped cooked chicken, either roasted or boiled.
Beat up two eggs and work them in with the whole mixture.
Flour your hands and make into small, round, flat cakes.
Dip the cakes in egg and bread crumbs.
Fry like fish cakes in butter and good sweet lard mixed, or like fried cakes in plenty of hot lard.
Take them up with a skimmer and lay them on brown paper to free them from the grease.
Serve hot.
Make the battered chicken
Make a common batter.
Mix into it a cupful of chopped tomatoes, one onion chopped, some minced parsley, salt and pepper.
Cut up young, tender chickens, dry them well, and dip each piece in the batter.
Fry the battered pieces until browned in plenty of butter in a thick-bottomed frying pan.
Serve with tomato sauce.
Make the meat cakes
Take any kind of fresh meat or fowl, chop very fine.
Add an equal quantity of smoothly mashed potatoes.
Mix and season with butter, salt, black pepper, a little prepared mustard, and a little cayenne pepper.
Make into cakes.
Dip in egg and bread crumbs.
Fry until a light brown.
Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)
What these numbers assume: 11 portions
| Ingredient | Portion assumed | kcal |
|---|---|---|
| Flour | 1 cup (125g) all-purpose | 455 |
| Chicken | 100g cooked | 165 |
| Butter | 1 tbsp (14g) | 102 |
| Egg | 1 large egg (50g) | 78 |
| Cream | 1 tbsp (15ml) heavy | 51 |
| Onion | 1 medium (110g) | 44 |
| Tomato | 1 medium (123g) | 22 |
| Black Pepper | 1 tsp ground (2.3g) | 6 |
| Cayenne | 1 tsp (1.8g) | 6 |
| Mustard | 1 tsp (5g) yellow | 3 |
| Salt | 1 tsp (6g) | 0 |
One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.
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.
-
Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Tomato + peppertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together17,923 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
-
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
-
Tomato + oniontop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together20,633 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
-
Tomato + chickentop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,031 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Flour
- Thickens the gravy and the cream sauce, and helps the coating brown.
- Eggs
- Bind the chicken cake mixture and help the crumb coating stick.
- Bread crumbs
- Form a crisp, browned outer coating and help bind the cakes.
- Cream
- Adds richness and body to the gravy and sauce.
- Butter
- Adds fat for frying and flavour to the browned coating.
- Mashed potatoes (in the method)
- Add bulk and softness that hold the minced meat together in cakes.
The step that matters
Let the cream sauce boil up thick before adding the chicken. The flour must be cooked in the boiling liquid to thicken fully and lose its raw taste. If the sauce is too thin, the cakes will not hold their shape when fried.
Swap the tomato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, bread, flour, cream, pepper, chicken, onion):
- Potatofits better
- Leekfits better
- Chivefits better
- Tomatothe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, bread, flour, cream, pepper, chicken, onion. 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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