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Chicken Pie

A baked chicken pie with a buttery sauce and a flour-based crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Chicken Pie

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the chicken

  1. Cover the chicken with cold water.

  2. Simmer gently until two-thirds cooked.

  3. Add coarse sea salt to the broth.

  4. Continue cooking until the meat is tender.

  5. Remove larger bones.

Make the sauce

  1. Place the chicken in a baking dish.

  2. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  3. Whisk in the flour and pepper.

  4. Gradually add the warm broth and milk or cream.

  5. Cook until bubbling.

  6. Pour the sauce over the chicken.

  7. Reserve some sauce for gravy.

  8. Keep the dish in the oven to stay warm while preparing the crust.

Make the crust and bake

  1. In a mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt.

  2. Rub in the shortening.

  3. Mix in the lightly beaten egg and milk to form a batter.

  4. Spread the batter over the chicken.

  5. Bake until golden.

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.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Chicken + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,389 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  4. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Chicken
Supplies the meat that becomes tender during slow simmering and forms the pie's filling.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour to the roux that thickens the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the sauce with the butter and forms the structure of the crust.
Broth
Provides the liquid base and savoury flavour for the sauce.
Milk or cream
Adds creaminess and body to the sauce.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter so the crust rises and becomes light.
Egg
Binds the crust batter and helps it set and brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Rub in the shortening. Rubbing fat into flour coats the flour particles and limits gluten development, so the crust stays tender rather than tough. The fat should stay cool and fully incorporated for an even texture.

“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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