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Smothered Chicken

Chicken cooked with butter, stock, flour, giblets, and cream to form a gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.) · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 3 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 23% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 21,449 recipes. Both carry acetic acid, which smells sour, vinegar. The science ↓

Smothered Chicken

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Put a quarter-pound of butter and a small cup of stock in the bottom of the pan.

  2. Split the chickens down the back, season with pepper and salt, and dredge well with flour all over.

  3. The chickens should be put in the pan breast down.

Cook

  1. When you put the chickens in the pan, put the giblets under them, and allow fifteen minutes to a pound.

  2. Cover the pan closely, and baste every ten or fifteen minutes.

Make the gravy

  1. When done, take out the chickens, mash the giblets, and add half pint of rich cream which makes the gravy.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

57Calories
1 gProtein
6 gFat
2 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Cream1 tbsp (15ml) heavy51
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Salt1 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.

By Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.). Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. Cream + peppertop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together21,449 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 21,449 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

Cream
Adds richness and body, forming the base of the gravy.
Butter (in the method)
Adds fat and richness to the pan and helps the chicken brown.
Flour (in the method)
Dredged over the chicken, it helps form a browned crust and thickens the juices.

The step that matters

Basting the chicken. Covered cooking traps steam, so basting every ten or fifteen minutes returns moisture and fat to the meat and keeps the surface from drying out.

“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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